Diamond in the Rough
by carzla
Summary: [Fantasy AU Cap-IMBB2013] Responding to HYDRA's increased activity, the War God has sent a missive. Captain Steven Rogers, a paladin, is sent with cleric, Peggy Carter, to slow HYDRA's noxious spread. They encounter the warlock, Antonius, who is more than any of them expected and holds his share of secrets. And HYDRA may have the only weapon that could cripple the good paladin.
1. Chapter 1

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 1_

_Disclaimer:_

_The Avengers belong to Marvel. This story contains slash and temporary major character death; feel free to hit the back button if that's not to your tastes. I only own this plot idea. Thank you._

* * *

**Full Summary:**

**[Fantasy AU | Cap-Iron Man Big Bang 2013] In response to the disturbing increase in activities of the cult organization, HYDRA, the War God has sent a missive for his followers to take action. Captain Steven Rogers, a paladin in the War God's ranks, is sent with a fellow cleric, Margaret Carter, on the quest to slow down HYDRA's noxious spread. They encounter the notorious warlock, Antonius, who joins them on their north-bound journey. Antonius is more than any of them had expected and holds secrets that have yet to be discovered. And HYDRA… HYDRA may just have the only weapon that could cripple the good paladin.**

* * *

"_Is he ready?"_

"_More than ready, my lord."_

"_No further resistance?"_

"_Not since the spell was cast. He believes he was always one of us, and he is most loyal for it."_

"_Good." A pause. "What of our adversaries?" _

"_There has been no sign of movement as of this moment."_

"_But they will come to oppose us again, I have no doubt. We will need to prepare. See to it."_

"_Yes, my lord."_

* * *

Steven Rogers awoke to the sound of crisp knocking on the door of his room. He glanced out of the window by his bed and judged it to be just a little earlier than the time he usually wakes up. People normally weren't in the habit of bothering each other this early in the morning, so it was probably something important.

"I'm coming! Give me a moment!" he called out.

"Captain Rogers! I'm just here to inform you that your presence is required in the main hall as soon as possible. There is an urgent missive for you," the messenger announced.

"I understand. I'll be there shortly. Thank you!"

Missives that were given out in the main hall tended to be extremely important, and were usually sent down by the War God Fury himself – through his high priests of course. Knowing that made Steve more alert than he usually would be just after getting out of bed. With that spurt of energy, he quickly went through his morning routine and then dressed appropriately for his meeting.

When he entered the hall soon afterwards, he found that he was not the only one there. Standing in the middle of the room in a modest grey dress was Margaret Carter, known as Peggy to her close friends, of which Steve was proud to be one of. Peggy was also one of the finest clerics Steve has had the pleasure of knowing in his time as a paladin of the War God Fury.

"Steve!" Peggy exclaimed in happiness as she spotted him entering the hall.

"Peggy," he greeted, a big smile on his face. "So, I assume that we're to be sent on the same quest?"

"It does seem likely."

There was a subtle clearing of someone's throat and both Steve and Peggy's attention snapped to the front of the hall, where Phil Coulson now stood. Coulson was the highest ranking priest in the Church and his presence added an even clearer element of importance to the new quest Steve and Peggy were to be sent on. It was said that Coulson had the ability to meet with the War God directly, and had done so countless of times.

There were also whispered rumors that Coulson was a demigod himself. Considering the man's startling efficiency and eerie near-omniscient knowledge of many, many things… Well, should the rumor ever prove to be true, Steve would not be shocked. Not in the very least.

"Steven, Margaret, thank you for being prompt in your response to your summons despite the early hour of the day," Coulson said in his almost preternaturally calm and unruffled voice. "We have been monitoring a particular cult organization and of late, it has become more overt in expanding its reach. You may find the name familiar; they are called _HYDRA_."

Steve froze. HYDRA, yes indeed, he knew the name. A few years ago, he had encountered members of the cult. He had left that meeting bearing the loss of his first and best friend, and while he had mostly moved on, sometimes the gap in his life that was once occupied by Bucky still ached very, very deeply. Beside him, Peggy too, tensed up. She had been with him and Bucky on the day of that fateful encounter. It was her steadfast and unwavering presence, despite her own grief, that helped him deal with the loss.

"HYDRA's plans have been linked to the devil known as the Red Skull, and they appear to seek to aid the devil in dominating and conquering the mortal plane. It is a situation we must prevent at all costs. The War God has decided to send the two of you on a journey to cripple HYDRA's northern stronghold, one of their central bastions of power as of late. Your efforts over the years have proven you most capable and therefore suitable for this quest."

A part of Steve wondered if the God of War or Coulson knew about their altercation with HYDRA from those years back. It wouldn't be too surprising if they had that knowledge and that it played a part in the decision to send him and Peggy instead of the other paladins and clerics of the Church.

"Just the two of us?" Peggy asked with a slight furrow of her brow.

"Yes, just the two of you," Coulson affirmed. "No one else has been deemed suitable for this task. You may, however, gather comrades to help you on your journey, if the need for other areas of expertise should arise. Discretion is advised, however, when choosing additional compatriots. As of this moment, we do not want to unnecessarily alarm the general populace. Even in our Church, only the highest ranking members know the full details of your quest. Do you have any more questions?"

Both Steve and Peggy shook their heads.

"Very well. You are scheduled to depart tomorrow. We have arranged for some supplies and a guide who has traveled across various parts of the lands to accompany you. Take care on your journey. We expect good news from the two of you."

* * *

The guide that Coulson arranged for them was a man by the name of Clint Barton, and was probably the only other person outside of the Church who knew the nature of their quest. Coulson introduced them in the early morning of their departure and also handed them a scroll containing more information that would aid them. Introductions made, Coulson wished them all luck before leaving to attend to the rest of his duties for the day.

Clint was a man of average height but he had a wiry build that spoke of some form of martial training. Then there was the way that Clint carried himself. A sort of feel to him that seemed to suggest that there was more to the man than being just a guide. When Steve saw the bow and quiver next to Clint's traveling pack, he wasn't too surprised.

"I used to hunt," Clint explained, likely in response to seeing how Steve was looking at his weapon. "And there're always bandits lurking in the woods preying on travelers, especially those who travel alone."

Steve decided that men who had tried to trifle with Clint simply because he was traveling alone would've been in for a nasty surprise.

"I hope you're all good with walking long distances. Coulson didn't want to attract too much attention by requesting steeds for us," Clint added.

"We'll be fine," Peggy replied firmly.

It was not uncommon for most of their journeys to be done on foot unless extreme haste was required, so both he and Peggy were used to it. Coulson was confident that they would have enough time to reach the HYDRA fortress in the far northern mountains. If they had to make haste for whatever reason, horses could still be obtained along the journey.

When each of them had finished their pre-departure preparations and were ready to leave, Clint gave a sudden, sharp whistle. From the skies, a hawk descended and landed on Clint's left shoulder. The archer smiled a little as he reached out to gently stroke its side.

"This is Artemis," he said. "She'll be coming with us."

"She's gorgeous," Steve said sincerely.

"She is," Peggy agreed.

"Good. Now that we've all been introduced, we should probably leave."

* * *

The early days of their journey were mostly uneventful. Clint was an excellent guide. He knew the fastest routes and had an exceptionally keen eye for spotting danger, be it in the form of traps and snares or approaching bandits. Thanks to that, they made good time and encountered far less trouble than Steve usually did when he was traveling alone or with the other clerics and paladins.

There were still some skirmishes with highwaymen where Steve had the opportunity to see Clint's very formidable archery skills. He had yet to see the archer miss, even from the most improbable angles. Clint could also handle himself in close combat and during the odd times when he was just slightly becoming overwhelmed, Artemis (who normally stayed out of the way during a fight) would swoop in to claw at the assailant's eyes. No doubt master and hawk had their own system of handling a fight.

Eventually, they determined that the most expedient route to HYDRA's icy mountain fortress was through a town called Ironfields, reputed to be ruled by a notorious warlock famous for terrorizing any battlefield he had chosen to tread upon. It was always wise to treat such rumor with some skepticism as it was not uncommon for gross embellishments to occur. But it appeared that in every place they had stopped at, the townspeople were all in agreement about the warlock's battlefield might, his proclivity to flirt, as well as his ability to forge weapons of quality that even the dwarves were hard-pressed to find fault with it.

Dwarven weaponry was of almost incomparable quality. The only humans known to have gained their grudging recognition were those from the Stark clan. As far as anyone knew, the Starks had no blood relations this far up north and the true origins of Antonius the Capricious (or the Death-Dealer as the more _opinionated _folk called him) still remained a mystery.

As far as Steve knew, Antonius _had_ come to the attention of the War God, and therefore the Church, back when he had still been active on a myriad of battlefields that preceded the more peaceful times they were currently experiencing. There had been the fear that Antonius' formidable prowess on the battlefield and by virtue of being someone who came out of nowhere, could lead to catastrophic outcomes should he decide to pursue a path of evil like what a great number of other warlocks has done so before him. The Church had not been able to determine his origins. But as Antonius never showed signs of becoming power-hungry and seemed content with merely rendering his services for a sizeable fee, the Church had become less worried about the warlock. That had been roughly seven years ago.

Steve didn't like to judge a person solely by reputation, but there was precious little known facts about the man. Despite the Church's efforts to discover Antonius' past, they still hadn't been able to find much more than hearsay. All warlocks tended to be met with suspicion and for a warlock with a reputation built primarily on war, weapons, and little else to go on with… Steve had to concede that it would be prudent to be more careful. Peggy was also of the opinion that they should minimize the length of their stay in town as short as possible. Clint, on the other hand, had no opinion on it. Steve had realized early on that not much really rattled the archer, perhaps because of the time he'd spent wandering the lands alone with only Artemis as his companion.

It was early evening by the time they approached the outskirts of the town and the previously cool weather was starting to get a little chilly. As the town came within sight, they were surprised by the state of the houses. Usually the poorer areas of any town were on the outskirts, but it appeared that all the houses that they could see had brick walls and tiled roofs, standards which even some normal housing in other cities did not meet. Walking further inside towards the town center revealed the mix of the town's population. Many different races were present, humans still the most prevalent, but there were a good number of elves and dwarves, as well as a few other races too. There were also, strangely enough, no children around.

"Interesting place, huh?" Clint commented, his eyes scanning around them and undoubtedly cataloguing everything in sight.

Steve wasn't sure what he expected of the town, but perhaps he'd expected to see some neglect, especially in the poorer areas. Antonius' reputation didn't generally give one the impression of being a particularly caring ruler who would see to all the needs – and then some – of those he governed. It was a pleasant surprise to be proven wrong in that aspect. The lack of children running about, however, was puzzling. This _was_ a new town but surely there would be some families too.

As they made their way past the outskirts and towards the town center, they were occasionally given quick, almost furtive, looks by the resident population. Some of the residents seemed to disappear from sight once they'd spotted their traveling group as well. Others, all dressed in semi-standardized wear, were giving them obviously assessing looks before continuing on their way. Steve deduced that they were a patrol force. All in all, there weren't any signs of outright hostility, but Steve couldn't help but feel that the people didn't seem to like the presence of new travelers.

Xenophobia felt a bit odd in a place where the population was made up of such a diverse mix of races, but it was probably still likely. As with many things, little oddities were quirks of nature.

* * *

"Rhodes, there's a group of three travelers that have just entered town. They look like they're staying the night," Natasha said as she entered the office in a manner that seemed like she just materialized out of thin air.

Travelers weren't very common in their town, especially not those who stayed overnight. Rhodes and Natasha had an agreement that any traveler that appeared remarkable in any way was to be noted and carefully observed. Tony did not know about this, but more often than not, Tony was completely oblivious to the existence, much less the meaning, of the word "safety" when applied to himself.

By this time, Rhodes was more or less accustomed to Natasha slipping in and out of a location without a whisper of sound and calmly asked for more pertinent information instead. "Defining traits?"

"All human, two males and one female. The female appears to be a cleric from the star pendant she wears around her neck. The taller male looks to be a warrior, though the symbol on his armor suggests that he worships the same deity as the cleric. Possibly a paladin. The last man is likely their guide; he's an archer," Natasha reported smoothly.

Rhodes frowned slightly. A cleric and a possible paladin in town? Not really a good thing. Tony's days on the battlefields were over, but that particular part of the man's history still caused others to want his life, or at the very least capture him. Then there were those who wanted Tony to use his abilities for themselves, though that was less likely with the current group in town. There was also the slight but still reasonable possibility that the Stark clan had finally decided to track down their wayward heir. Tony had made it expressly clear that he'd take death over returning to the clan that had all but thrown him out because of his warlock powers manifesting. Rhodes might find it difficult to keep Tony out of the trouble his friend sometimes sought out, but he'd sure as hell try to keep any pursuers away. Not to mention, from all he had heard and _not _heard (the latter occurrence was far more informative than one would think) from Tony about the Stark clan and especially Tony's father, he would not want to return his best friend into their tender loving care anytime soon. If ever.

"We'll have to find out more about them. Natasha, can you do that?"

Natasha hesitated and that was when Rhodes belatedly realized that she had sounded unusually certain about the second man the archer. While it was easy to assume that if someone had a bow, he'd be an archer, Natasha never once made any of her observations sound like they were cold hard facts. It was probably due to her upbringing as a spy-assassin in a murky underworld where not everything was as they appeared and it translated over into most situations presented to the woman.

He hazarded a guess. "That archer… does he have any link to your past?"

Natasha nodded. "He's not a bad person, but I've… used him before. He may recognize me, even under disguise, which may not bode well."

If their spymaster admitted unease, then it was truly a sticky situation. Unfortunately, she was also their best bet at successfully obtaining information from the trio even with such odds, and this traveling group was of high importance. They _needed _to get accurate information about them. Sending Pepper as a substitute was not an option, regardless of how everyone in town would drop whatever they were doing to defend her at the slightest sign of hostility. Tony would also _kill _him for doing that, never mind the fact that Pepper wasn't trained in subterfuge or any real form of self-defense, unlike Natasha.

"I can still do it," Natasha added. "But we'll need a backup plan, just in case."

"A backup plan? Is something happening?" came the voice of Virginia, known as Pepper to her closest friends.

"Pepper, a trio of travelers is staying the night here. We're doing the usual, but one of them used to know Natasha. It might be a problem," Rhodes replied.

Normally, neither he nor Natasha liked to involve Pepper, but there was no point in trying to lie to the lady in question now that she was present and had even overheard some of their discussion. Pepper was very resourceful, so she could help in coming up with a contingency plan.

"There's one female, likely a cleric, and two males. One may be a paladin; the other an archer. The archer is the one who might recognize me, even in disguise," Natasha added, showing that she was in silent agreement with Rhodes about involving Pepper.

Pepper made a considering noise as she ran over the information she was given. "A possible paladin and cleric. If you're right about that – and you usually are – they won't let anything happen in a public space like the inn. I think that regardless of whether your cover is blown, Natasha, you should extend an invitation for them to be our guests here. This way, we can keep an eye on them in case of anything suspicious, and if nothing happens, it'll serve to show them our hospitality," she suggested. "Plus, I think it's time we attempted to correct how Tony is perceived because of his battlefield reputation and generally just from being a warlock. Don't you agree?"

The other two nodded in agreement with Pepper's last statement. It would certainly help in keeping Tony safe if less people were out for his hide based on flawed information.

"Won't Tony have issues with having unexpected guests?" Rhodes then asked. "Isn't he in his busy phase now?"

Surprisingly, Natasha smirked at the question, valid though it was. "He won't grumble for long. They're all easy on the eyes, to say the least."

Tony wasn't quite as superficial as he liked to make people believe he was, but all three of them knew well enough that Tony was less likely to have serious complaints about being interrupted if it was for a non-boring, visually appealing cause. It wasn't as well known, but they also knew that Tony had no qualms about appreciating the physical form of either gender.

"I'll get him out and presentable, don't you worry," Pepper added a tad smugly. "It's been three days since he last surfaced, long enough for me to have the right to do as I please."

* * *

For a town of its size, there was only one relatively small inn available. The tavern they'd entered was by no means physically small, but it appeared that more space was dedicated to communal wining and dining than actual rooms to sleep and rest in. It was possibly because the town did not receive many visitors that stayed overnight. As a result, they were able to easily get two rooms for a decent price and it appeared that they were the only travelers in town at the moment. Steve and Peggy moved their belongings up into their respective rooms while Clint stayed behind to chat with the innkeeper, which he found wasn't really an easy task.

The innkeeper was quick to offer tips on the best places to buy food and supplies, as well as general advice about the weather and terrain of the area further up north. But when it came to local gossip, there wasn't much that he could find out. If his eyes weren't playing tricks on him, and they rarely ever did, Clint swore that the innkeeper's eyes went cold and guarded at his probing even though the man's lips were still turned up in a smile. Gut instinct told him not to try asking about Antonius despite having originally been in his plans, and so Clint bid goodbye and retreated up to the room he was sharing with Steve.

"Something's up with this place," he declared after shutting the door to the room and locking it. "I've never had this much trouble trying to get my hands on local gossip."

That was indeed news to Steve. In all the various places they'd stayed in previously, Clint had easily been able to chat up the locals for handy information.

"Nothing at all?"

"It was fine learning about the best places for us to get supplies, learning more about the climate and what to expect further up north. But in the way of local news, pretty much nothing. Not even the most harmless bit of gossip. I also had a feeling that if I tried asking about Antonius, we'd be shown out of the door faster than you could blink. So I didn't even bother."

"You make it sound like the innkeeper is protective of Antonius," Steve observed.

"Less protective, perhaps more wary? I mean, we've all heard about the man's reputation. He's a warlock, says he's retired from his mercenary, warmongering ways, but he's probably still ruling this place with an iron fist and has a ton of enemies from the past. Probably nobody wants to be seen or heard giving out information about Antonius in case they get into trouble."

"The state of the town doesn't seem to suggest that Antonius is cruel."

"Just a façade? Or maybe it's a carrot-and-stick approach. Give the residents incentive with good housing while still making sure they know what happens if they cross him? Though with how rich Antonius supposedly is, he could just be throwing gold at everyone all the time to make sure they do his bidding."

Clint was definitely a lot more jaded than Steve himself was, despite them being close in age. Sometimes, Steve felt that Clint's past was a lot more colorful than what he had let them know. As they journeyed together and Steve saw more of how Clint behaved and interacted with the world, it seemed odd for Clint to be a mere hunter in the wilds. In any case, Steve was still more likely to give someone the benefit of the doubt than Clint would and in this situation, he was hoping that perhaps Antonius' reputation had also been unduly exaggerated.

Steve was silent for perhaps a tad too long. Clint looked at him again, possibly reading the skepticism and hope for a more positive reason, because the guide spoke again.

"You really like trying to see the good side of people, don't you?"

"I just think that maybe he does have a past as a mercenary, but it doesn't mean that he's a bad person. Times were hard back then with constant warring between lords and cities and it's possible he only became a mercenary because it was a way to get by. He did disappear from the battlefields when things started becoming more peaceful. I just think that if he was really a warmonger like what some of the rumors seem to say, he wouldn't have built a village that grew into a town that is, for all purposes, a peaceful place."

"War changes people, Steve. He could've started out of necessity, but who knows if he's still the same. And well, warlocks don't have the best reputation for staying on the straight and narrow, or even keeping much of their sanity. Besides, it's known that warlocks gained their power by making deals with supernatural entities. Even if war hadn't changed Antonius, the contract he made with whatever creature to gain his powers would definitely have had an effect on his psyche."

Admittedly, Clint had a point. Plus, there was something dark that settled in the other man's expression that made Steve think that Clint had personal experience in what he was talking about. It would not be surprising that Clint himself had worked as a mercenary, despite only having told them that he used to be a hunter before becoming a guide.

Technically, Steve supposed, "hunter" could be an accurate term. It was just hunting humans. But it had always been a trait of his to give someone the benefit of the doubt, even more so when he didn't actually know them yet. But he guessed that right now, what Antonius really was like was not a major concern of theirs.

* * *

Tony wasn't sure what to expect when Pepper all but dragged him out of the workshop to prepare for dinner. She said that there would be guests and it was important that he didn't make a bad impression. Tony supposed that at least she hadn't said to make a _good _impression, because he wasn't sure if he would ever succeed on that front. He didn't like to disappoint her, even though it happened more often than not.

So Tony cleaned himself up as told and changed into the clean clothes he found already laid out on his bed. The combination of a deep red dress shirt and black dress pants weren't the most formal garb he owed, for which he was glad. He rarely entertained guests in his home that required formal attire. To be honest, he never conducted any proper business in the mansion, even if he fobbed off to Rhodey and Pepper that the women, and sometimes men, he brought back had important business to discuss with him. Not that they believed him; they knew him too well for that.

Which made it strange for guests that he knew nothing about to be invited to the mansion.

At this moment, there was a knock on his door and he called out, "Come in, Pepper."

When Pepper appeared, she took in his appearance with a satisfied smile. "Good, I was afraid you'd put up more resistance."

"Against you? My dearest lady, never!"

Pepper just shook her head, knowing how much that proclamation wasn't true. "Okay Tony, I have some information about our guests that you should know. They're travelers staying in town and two of them are subjects of the War God Fury-"

"Wait. Are you telling me that these guests are pompous, "I-am-holier-than-thou-just-because" clerics?"

"Well, one of them is a paladin."

"A paladin," Tony repeated, his voice devoid of inflection. "Because that's so much better than just clerics. Why did you decide to invite them, Pepper? Did I do something to seriously annoy you?" he continued, voice taking on a slightly more plaintive note towards the end.

"It's not that, Tony. This… This is for your sake."

Then it clicked. It was another manifestation of Rhodey's and Natasha's ideas for his safety. When did Pepper get involved in it? Though most probably, she'd been in on it with them from the start. Natasha must have learnt about these travelers via her super-secret spy network, told Rhodey and gotten Pepper involved.

"This is about protecting me, isn't it? In case they're actually here to capture or kill me, and what? You think this will preempt it or change their minds? Well if there's a paladin, he probably wouldn't condone outright murder, so there's that. But why bother to invite them? I know Rhodey and Natasha have their own ways of dealing with these situations, and it _never _involved me directly."

"It's different this time. The last person in the group is someone from Natasha's past. She said it was possible that he'd see through her disguise."

"There's a guy who encountered Natasha in her Black Widow days and didn't end up _dead_?" Even as Tony expressed his incredulousness (and with good reason), he knew that this couldn't be good.

Whoever this last guy was, chances were that he was probably a trained assassin as well.

"Apparently so," Pepper replied calmly. "Natasha didn't say what went on between them, but told us that he's an excellent archer; she's never seen him miss a mark."

The trained assassin theory was looking more and more likely. So maybe it was the archer's presence that had gotten Pepper and Rhodey worried for his life. Though why would a cleric and a paladin even associate with an assassin?

"So, he's an assassin?"

"He wasn't when Natasha knew him. She thinks that he's their guide."

"Okay. So, how does inviting these people to dinner help with anything?"

"We think it's time that you cleared up your reputation a bit."

"Reputation? What reputation?" Tony answered blithely, though in truth, he was well aware of what was said about him outside of the town he was technically in-charge of.

Pepper gave him a look that told him that she was on to his bullshit. As usual. Nevertheless, she still explained. "The reputation that you gained when you were still a mercenary with unprecedented talent in the art of destruction and more importantly the rumors that suggest you're a warmonger. You know that there are people who would like to see you brought down or even killed."

"Pepper, even if I had never been on a battlefield, there would _still _be people who want me dead. I'm not a nice person, you know that."

"There's no harm in doing this. Besides, you need to socialize more."

"Really, Pepper? _I _need to socialize?" Tony said with a deliberately lewd leer.

It didn't have an effect on Pepper, who merely glared a little and said, "Yes. The kind of socializing that doesn't involve the bedroom. You're going along with this, Tony, and you're not going to screw it up on purpose."

Tony gave a dramatic sigh but did not protest any further. Pepper, Rhodey and Natasha had to have planned this to the letter and had all sorts of contingency plans. Natasha, especially, would not have qualms in drugging him just to get him to agree. It was better to save his dignity and agree to the dinner rather than fight a losing battle.

He could be pragmatic when it was required. He just hoped really hard that this dinner would not be too much of a chore.

* * *

Later in the evening, Steve and Clint met Peggy down in the common room of the inn for their evening meal. They had just settled down at a table when a redheaded barmaid approached them.

"Sirs, ma'am, I have a message from Lord Antonius. He would like to invite you to his home for dinner," she said shyly, not really keeping eye contact with any of them.

Steve and Peggy looked at each other in surprise. This was… unexpected. They had not thought that their presence would have been noticed by the warlock. It would be impolite to decline the invitation at best. At worst, Antonius could think that they had some agenda being in his town. Steve glanced at Clint, wanting to see if he had any opinion on this matter but found that his attention was focused unerringly on the barmaid. The serious expression on his face was akin to the times they had gotten into skirmishes with brigands.

Before any of them could ask Clint what was wrong however, Artemis suddenly appeared, flying straight for the barmaid and landing on her shoulder. There was, strangely enough, no sign of panic or fear on the barmaid's face, but there couldn't have been a way for her to know that the hawk would not attack her. Right?

"Natalie?" Clint finally spoke, his tone was slightly shocked.

The barmaid, who hadn't been properly meeting their eyes previously and had appeared to be shy and unsure of herself, straightened up and all at once, her entire demeanor changed. She looked up properly at each of them, her gaze hard and piercing, as if she could see all of their secrets with just one look. She held herself as if she was poised right on the edge of movement and there was a grace about her that felt not unlike that of a panther. Steve felt himself becoming on edge.

"Clint," the woman finally acknowledged, and even her voice was different. Still soft, but with a core of steel underneath. "I had guessed that you'd see through my disguise eventually, even without Artemis."

The hawk in question was still perched on her shoulder. Clint's smile was strained, looking almost like a grimace.

"Well, she always liked you."

"Excuse me," Peggy interrupted, though not sounding all that sorry about it. "Who are you exactly?"

"My name is Natasha – 'Natalie' was a cover. I've come on Lord Antonius' behalf to invite all three of you for dinner and to spend the rest of your stay there, however long it may be, as his personal guests. It is rare for us to have visitors from the Church of Fury and he would like to extend a warm welcome. We have many guestrooms available for your use."

"We have already acquired rooms here," Peggy said.

"You will be refunded fully. Lord Antonius has already reimbursed the inn for their loss of business."

As if on a cue, the innkeeper appeared with a bag of coins which was handed over to Peggy. Now, there really wasn't a good way to decline the invitation without seeming rude and ungrateful. Steve stood up and then bowed slightly.

"We would be honored to take up Lord Antonius' invitation."

"I will be waiting here to accompany you to the mansion," Natasha replied.

Despite the fact that that was all Natasha said, Steve could not help but hurry as the three of them headed back to collect their belongings. He couldn't say that he was looking forward to the dinner, but it would be an excellent way for him to determine, once and for all, just what sort of person Antonius was.

When they returned to the common room, Natasha was indeed waiting for them. Artemis was still on her shoulder, but when Clint came into sight, the hawk flew to him instead. Clint had been quiet since Natasha revealed her true name and Steve was curious as to how they'd known each other. He wasn't going to ask, however, because from what he had seen so far, Clint and Natasha probably had not parted on good terms. Clint seemed to be shocked that "Natalie" was a false name and Steve guessed that the archer probably had put a lot of trust in "Natalie".


	2. Chapter 2

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 2_

The walk to Antonius' abode did not take very long, even though it was located further away from the town center. When the house came into view, however, Steve was hard pressed _not_ to gawk. It was a mansion, and one that could almost rival the size of smaller palaces. There were defensive walls surrounding the mansion and possibly much of the land around it. In the waning evening light, the banners that he could see fluttering in the gentle breeze were colored in vibrant, ostentatious red and gold. This was the home of a man who sought and thrived under attention. Natasha led them through the open gates (thankfully not done up in red and gold, but instead was in imposing, black steel), and as they passed through, Steve felt the ripple of magic wash around him. Wards. The entire place was covered heavily with protective magic.

As they drew closer to the main doors, they came open and a dark-skinned man and a lady with long strawberry-blond hair stepped out.

"Natasha, I see you've had no problems with sending out our invitation," said the lady with a warm smile on her face.

Natasha gave a slight shrug that looked more like an elegant, languid roll of her shoulders. Steve could once again see that the redhead was definitely highly-trained. He directed his gaze to the other two newcomers. The man was dressed semi-causally and held himself in parade rest though Steve could tell the man was poised on his feet, ready to spring into action should the slightest threat arise. Definitely ex-military. The other woman, however, did not seem to be cut from the same cloth as Natasha nor the man. Her smile was genuinely friendly and welcoming. Her ease with the other two, though, spoke of familiarity, and Steve supposed that while she was probably not a combatant herself, she would know how to handle herself should a confrontation break out.

Then the lady stepped forward, looking at Steve one hand extended forward. "I'm Virginia Potts and I help Tony run his business and his town. You can call me Pepper."

Steve momentarily wondered who "Tony" was, until he realized it was a shortened form of Antonius' name. There was probably more to Antonius and Pepper's relationship than merely employer-employee if her term of address was anything to go by. He took Pepper's hand to give it a firm shake as he introduced himself and the rest of his companions. The man came forward too, and introduced himself as James Rhodes. Together with Natasha, he was in-charge of overseeing security of the town.

With introductions over, Pepper invited all of them in. The inside of the mansion was just as lavish as its sheer size had suggested, and the red-and-gold color scheme was more evident than ever. The vermilion carpets were plush and well cared for. Most of the furniture was made out of quality mahogany that had been well-polished, and a good portion had intricate designs on the legs gilded with gold and some pieces had red gemstones set in them. Steve could not decide if they were rubies or extremely rare, colored diamonds because Antonius looked like he'd be well able to afford them. There was also a surprising number of elegant art pieces on the wall, and Steve found himself looking at some of them a lot more and felt it was slightly incongruous that Antonius' mostly flashy décor thus far, did not result in more ostentatious pieces of work.

"Pepper chose the art pieces," Natasha murmured and Steve had to fight not to jump in surprise. He had not heard the spy come close at all.

"I see…"

Well, that would explain the choice of paintings, and implied, once again, that Antonius and Pepper had a closer relationship. Steve was not one to gossip or put his nose into other people's business, but it still seemed a little strange that someone like Pepper would be with Antonius. Then he reminded himself that all he knew about Antonius at the moment were mere hearsay and he really should reserve any actual judgment until he had met the man himself. Not to mention whatever he thought was between Antonius and Pepper could just be his imagination.

Following a quick tour of the premises, including the dining hall so that they would not get lost while trying to get to the common areas, they were shown to the guestrooms to put down their baggage, although Pepper had suggested that they could bring along their weapons because Antonius loved to see weaponry made by other smiths. There was a wry twist to her lips that also seemed to imply that Antonius' interest wasn't entirely for learning from the other blacksmiths. They were also informed that a bell would ring to inform them when dinner was ready.

When he stepped into the room given to him, Steve revised his idea of what a guestroom in the wealthy warlock's mansion was. It was almost like a suite of rooms. He had his own lounge area that contained a cupboard stocked with a variety of alcohol. In the furthest reach of the room was a massive four-poster bed and a closed set of double doors that he guessed was the closet – a very large closet. Another single door was left slightly ajar and he could tell that it was likely the bathroom. Lastly, on the side opposite the bedroom, there was a mini library complete with a study desk.

He wasn't quite sure what to do with all this _space._ Well, he was probably going to have to settle in, so he headed towards the closet's double doors and pulled them open.

Steve boggled for a second. The closet itself was large enough to be a decently sized _room _for someone to live in. In one corner of the closet was an array of pillows, cushions and duvets that seemed excessive when the bed already had more pillows than Steve knew what to do with and the lounge seats were similarly covered with enough cushions. He also didn't think it would get cold enough to warrant using more duvets, especially since the one on the bed looked thick enough. The rest of the space was left empty, probably for guests to store their clothes for the duration of their stay.

Who would bring enough clothes to fill the entire closet? It seemed far too excessive, though he was getting the impression that Antonius did many things in excess. So far the only people he'd seen in the house were Pepper and Rhodey. Even if Steve assumed that Natasha also had rooms in the mansion, that meant there were four people living in this large house. Perhaps there were other servants that he just hadn't come across yet? Nonetheless, it felt a little lonely to Steve.

He went about unpacking his belongings, placing them in the corner closest to the doors and absently noted that they took up less than a tenth of the space in the closet. As he undid his heavy armor, he considered what Pepper said about Antonius being interested in seeing their weaponry and decided that he considered his shield as a weapon just as he did his longsword. So he carefully set aside both shield and sword to be brought down later.

* * *

A while later, Steve, Clint and Peggy all came down to the dining hall with Pepper welcoming them and directing them to their seats like the perfect hostess. Despite having been exposed to parts of the mansion already, it was still a little difficult for Steve's eyes to stop roaming the room. The artist in him was cataloguing all the details in the furnishings, as well as admiring the landscapes in the room. He was probably going to sketch some parts of the mansion at some point. Rhodes and Natasha entered shortly after, the latter having changed out of her barmaid attire into a dark-colored top and matching pants. Small talk and more pleasantries were exchanged.

"Pepper, do I need to remind Tony of dinner?" Natasha asked at one point.

As if on cue, Antonius strode into the dining hall with a smile on his face. He was dressed in a well-cut dark red shirt and fitting black pants. The materials were clearly expensive but they were surprisingly less extravagant than what Steve had expected from looking at the man's home. The man also did not look like a feared warlock with a reputation forged from the depths of battles, despite having a clear aura of confidence and seeming to be larger than life.

"I haven't kept anyone waiting, have I?"

"For once, no," Pepper said, a fond expression on her face.

"I would never disappoint you, would I, Pepper?" Turning to look at his guests, the man's smile widened a little as he said, "I'd apologize, but nobody did tell me your names."

A quick round of introductions was once again made and Antonius smiled and greeted all of them with a firm handshake, although Peggy was also given a kiss on the back of her hand. Steve also thanked the man for letting his party stay in his abode, to which Antonius laughed and insisted that it was no trouble at all.

Throughout their travels, all they had heard about Antonius did not even begin to cover the man's actual personality. The man seemed to fairly radiate charm in the easy manner of his wide smiles and Steve had seen genuine fondness in Antonius' brown eyes when the warlock was looking at Pepper. He really wasn't quite able to see the image that he'd originally painted of Antonius the Capricious.

"Right, I think we're all hungry from the long day," Antonius stated after everyone had settled back down at the table. "Let's have the food served, shall we?"

Steve expected serving staff to appear following Antonius' proclamation, what actually happened, though, was very different. The food _did_ appear, but the dishes were not carried out by humans. In fact, what looked like three metallic, mechanical hands on wheels rolled out, as if on their own power, balancing trays of food .

Pepper, Rhodes and Natasha looked like this was nothing out of the ordinary but both Clint and Peggy were openly staring, just like Steve. The hands wheeled themselves, somehow, into what was likely a pre-agreed position around the table and deposited the trays, a little clumsily for one of them. Then they began to carefully distribute the plates.

"Don't worry, my kitchen staff are actually human and not mechanical hands. Your taste buds won't suffer," Antonius assured them, mirth twinkling bright in his eyes. "I wouldn't let Dummy near open fire anyway. He'd burn the entire place down."

The mechanical hand that was hovering nearest to Antonius drooped, as if dejected. But it visibly perked up again when Antonius extended a hand to pat it and murmured, "Good work today, Dummy."

That comment spurred the other two mechanical hands to go up to Antonius too, and to Steve's eye, looked as if they were demanding some sort of praise from the warlock as well, which Antonius freely gave each of them with fond exasperation evident in his tone of voice.

When the three mechanical hands finally rolled out of the room, Steve couldn't help but ask, "Did you create them, Lord Antonius?"

"First, please drop the "lord". Titles are all so stuffy and formal. And yes, I did create them. Dummy was the first, and he was something of an accident, at least the part where he became semi-sentient was due to accidental imbuing of magical energy, but it was a happy accident all the same."

Steve nodded. He had a slight worry though, about how Antonius had described his mechanized helpers as being semi-sentient. It seemed that it could be dangerous if full sentience somehow became possible, but he'd only just met Antonius and he didn't think it would be polite to pursue the topic further.

Then the dining part of the dinner came in earnest as everyone started on their food. Conversation started up and then began to flow more naturally as dinner progressed. Somehow, Pepper had picked up on his interest in the paintings and drew him into a conversation about art. Antonius was trying his best to charm Peggy, bordering on flirtatious at some points, although he made sure to engage Clint as well. As far as Steve could tell, all the conversations were focus on light topics although surely, Antonius had to be curious about their presence in his town.

When there was a lull in the hubbub of conversations, Antonius finally asked the question Steve had been expecting. "What business brings all of you up north? I'm afraid there isn't really anything of note further up north of my town. It just gets colder and much less pleasant."

"We're exploring, mainly," Peggy answered smoothly.

Prior to their departure, Steve and Peggy had decided to come up with a plausible cover story for their quest. Since Coulson had advised them to be cautious about revealing the true nature of their journey, it would be for the best that they knew what story to stick to should anyone ask them, be it out of curiosity or in more sinister situations. They had decided on an exploratory expedition.

"Exploring? Really? Ironfields is pretty much one of the last decently sized towns this far up north, well at least on the west side I suppose." Then suddenly, Antonius' grin became a little sharper. "Or… well, it wouldn't have anything to do with the strange happenings up in the mountains, would it?"

Steve was reminded in this instance that another reason why Antonius had been feared on the battlefields was not only because of his raw power. The man was very intelligent, a genius even.

"Strange happenings?" he asked.

They had heard that slowly, but surely, residents up in the north were starting to notice things that were potentially due to HYDRA's growing activities. But nobody in this town had shown signs of having that knowledge

"Freak storms, people disappearing, general strangeness in energy currents to those who can feel them, and all that. It's not all that bad here yet, but well, I hear things faster than most people thanks to Natasha's very extremely efficient information network."

He was met with silence as Steve and Peggy looked to each other, both wondering just how much Antonius knew and how much he wasn't revealing. The implications that Natasha was probably Antonius' spymaster was unsettling. Yet Pepper and Rhodes were both clearly friends with Antonius despite also working for him, and that painted a rather contradictory picture of Antonius.

"You don't have to be so worried. I'm not planning on interfering with whatever top-secret mission you have. But I have been apprised of the situation up north and well, I don't like the increasing saturation of dark energy in the air."

"What exactly do you know?" Peggy finally said.

"That there's some evil cult making a home up in the mountains and some really unnatural things have been happening over a rather long time already. I think it might be in your interests to expand your traveling group if you really are aiming to investigate up north."

"Are you offering your services?" Clint interjected with a cynical twist of his lips.

"Yes."

Both Pepper and Rhodes looked at Antonius in surprise. Clearly, this was a decision that had come out of nowhere. Natasha, on the other hand, still appeared utterly unflustered. If Steve had thought Clint was usually one of the least easily perturbed person, then Natasha was certainly up there too and was perhaps even more unflappable than the archer.

"Tony," Rhodes started to say, a disapproving frown forming on his face.

"Think about it, Rhodey. If something bad is happening up there, we'll definitely be hit with the repercussions. I'm just looking out for my town. You and Pepper are always saying I don't do enough for the day-to-day running of this place," Antonius cut in before the other man could finish. Then to the rest of them, he added, "Besides, more firepower wouldn't hurt for you, would it?"

"No," Peggy conceded even as she looked at Steve to gauge his response.

"It could be helpful. We were sent to neutralize a fortress base," Steve said.

"Sounds like you need all the help you can get, unless "fortress" was just an exaggeration."

"Doubtful," Natasha opined.

Dinner proceeded despite the more serious turn in the conversation. Antonius provided valid reasons for his inclusion in their traveling group, and despite his reservations, he had to admit that having Antonius' expertise would be beneficial. Peggy, too, seemed to be coming around to the idea and Clint had not voiced any objections, which coming from the archer was equivalent to an agreement. In the end, Steve and Peggy did have Coulson's permission to recruit people at their own discretion. When a conclusion had more or less been made, wherein Antonius managed to convince them into letting him join them despite some protests from Rhodes, Antonius expertly diverted everyone's attention by announcing it was time for desserts.

After their dessert had been cleared away, Antonius spoke again with a smile on his face and a sparkle in his eyes. "I hope you all enjoyed dinner; I know I did. So, if it's not too forward of me, I really am interested in seeing your weapons. For science."

In short order, a variety of weapons were laid carefully on the table and after a long look from the head of the table where he'd been standing, Antonius came over to Clint's bow and arrows. In a show of good etiquette, despite the clear interest the warlock had with weaponry and weapon craft, he asked for permission before picking up the bow for closer examination. Then he was making some rapid-fire suggestions for possible improvements to the bow and engaging Clint in a discussion.

Steve had noticed, though, that Antonius' gaze lingered on his shield the longest over all the weapons before the warlock had gone on to engage Clint in conversation. Not many people knew the significance of his shield, and how he tended to favor it over a sword in combat. He had been selected by the shield as it had been apparently been imbued with something resembling a conscious mind, limited in capacity though it was, that it could not be used proficiently by most people. He still remembered that many good men had come before the shield, but had walked away without its acceptance. It was a great honor to Steve that it had chosen him to wield it and on some days, still left him in awe that he'd been chosen at all.

"I could make you a new bow, if you give me some time," Antonius offered.

"You don't have to," Clint protested. "She hasn't really given me any trouble."

"No charge! I'm going to be joining your little group, aren't I? That makes it in my best interests to look out for your interests. I'd offer to improve _everyone's_ weapons, but I get the feeling that time is an issue and it's generally difficult to find much fault in Stark weaponry anyway."

Antonius' last sentence was directed mostly to Peggy and Steve, and Steve found himself rather impressed that the warlock was able to identify the origins of the weapons with just a cursory glance.

"We don't really have time to stop for long," Peggy acknowledged.

"As I thought. Well, I'll start with Clint's bow first. I can probably finish it tonight, maybe tomorrow."

Clint looked like he was about to protest again, but then Natasha glided closer to the man and said, "When he gets like this, there's no use arguing."

The duo shared a long look and seemed to be communicating with minor quirks of their facial muscles before Clint relented with a shrug. Then Natasha took her leave and Clint followed. Something about the way they left had Steve thinking that perhaps they were going to sort out whatever issues that still remained between them since their last meeting. Antonius looked like he was on the verge of making a quip but seemed to decide against it.

Instead, he turned to Steve. "Captain, if you don't mind, I would like to examine your shield in further detail in my workshop."

"I…" He was surprised, but found that he wasn't really adverse to the idea. Which was rather curious in and of itself. "That's fine."

"Wonderful! Pepper can give you directions. I'm going to work on the bow now. Come down whenever you want to, I'll probably be there all night."

* * *

So, Tony hadn't been expecting that all three of his guests would be as physically attractive as they were. Pepper hadn't mentioned it, but she had to have known that being taken away from his work to deal with pleasant-looking people would make it less likely for him to whine to her afterwards, and that it would greatly aid in him playing nice.

What threw him off completely, however, was the paladin, Steven. His shield, to be precise. Because Tony _recognized it_.

Certainly, he knew that the weapons that both Steven and Margaret used were of Stark-make, and could assume the same for the rest of their armor. But the shield, with its distinctive round shape and the star etched onto its surface… He knew, without even needing to feel the magical signature emanating from it, that this was the shield his father had personally crafted and enchanted, the one shield that he'd forbidden anyone else and quite expressly, _Tony_, to ever touch. He had later found out that it was because this shield was created with the ability to choose the warrior it would protect, a special, holy shield that Howard Stark hadn't wanted tainted.

The shield had been completed just a few days prior to Tony's own awakening as a warlock, and that knowledge was the quickest and most definite way for Tony to know how much his father detested him.

Now, confronted with that same shield and the person it now belonged to, the warped, unhealthy complex he'd developed towards his father was surfacing again. It was as if the shield represented all of Howard's disdain, and faced with Steven, a paladin who held the shield… It was as if Howard was showing Tony the type of person that Tony would never be and that Tony would never be able to meet Howard's expectations.

It was part actual interest in the shield and part perverse way of torture that prompted him to ask for a closer look at the shield. And it had to be the innate goodness in Steven that made him agree to it. Tony could tell that Steven had an attachment to the shield and clearly was slightly reluctant to hand it over to Tony, though he couldn't help but wonder if that reluctance came from the fact that Tony's powers were from dark origins and not because of Steven's own attachment.

It was a prejudice he wasn't unfamiliar with, especially in the days before he'd settled down. It no longer bothered him, what people who didn't matter to him thought. But when he thought that Steven could possibly be _that_ way too, well, it had been awhile since he felt that twist in his gut. The only reason he could think of for that reaction was that Steven was like a physical representation of his father and it was a twisted, roundabout way of gaining approval.

(If someone whom Dad liked approved of him, then wouldn't Dad do so too?)

When Steven turned up at his workshop with his shield in tow, Tony had changed into more comfortable, well-worn clothes and was in the midst of improving the balance of Clint's composite longbow. It wasn't uncommon for him to ruin his formal wear by toiling in them whenever inspiration struck, but it always made Pepper upset and he didn't want to risk that any time soon. If it also served to make Steven do a slight double take at his appearance – far from the rich, spoiled man that his entire property screamed – well, that was just a bonus.

"Captain, come in. I hope you don't mind the mess. I don't often bother with cleaning it up much; it just gets chaotic again the next day," he said with a welcoming smile as he put aside the bow carefully to continue working on it later.

* * *

Steve didn't quite know what he really was expecting when he agreed to let Antonius take a closer look at his shield. But he didn't expect to see the warlock dressed down in casual workmen's clothes that were already slightly soot-stained. He had thought that with almost an entire town of blacksmiths working for him, Antonius wouldn't need to ever set foot in a workshop to make anything himself, even if he still had one in his home. Steve had also assumed that perhaps Antonius would not personally be working on Clint's bow, but he was clearly mistaken on both accounts.

Antonius most definitely worked in his own workshop and, judging by the faint embers of coal, had probably been working (and planning on continuing his work) until shortly before dinner. He was most certainly working on Clint's bow when Steve had walked in. All in all, it didn't fit his image of Antonius after first seeing the man's opulent manor. Truth be told, Antonius had been making Steve revise his opinions of him since the moment they'd met. Then he remembered that Antonius gained his reputation on the battlefield, and it wouldn't have been uncommon for him to have worked in the camps where weapons could sometimes be short or in need of repair, or probably before he became famous. Or infamous, as it were.

He could appreciate a hard worker, even if he wasn't too comfortable with Antonius' past. Or with most of the man at present, really. Steve tried hard not to let prejudice influence him, but he couldn't pinpoint another reason for why Antonius seemed to cause a sense of unease in him. He just hoped it wasn't too obvious to the other man.

"I don't mind it," he said instead. "Thank you again for your gracious offer for us to stay the night."

Antonius laughed. "Oh no, I should be thanking you for letting me look at your shield. It's not every day you see something personally crafted by Howard Stark."

"How did you know that it was made by Lord Stark?"

"I studied weapon and armor craft extensively, Captain. I need to know my competitors well, especially the best of the best. Much as I hate to admit it, Howard Stark is that."

Steve put it down to rivalry between fellow weapon-makers for the dark expression that clouded Antonius' face at the mention of Howard's name even as it disappeared a split second later. A part of him couldn't help but note that rivalry didn't _usually_ put a haunted and uncommonly vulnerable expression on a person's face. It was an incongruous look on Antonius' visage, which had, up until now, only showed confidence bordering on arrogance and flirtatious charm.

"Would you like me to put the shield on your workbench?" Steve asked in lieu of furthering his train of thought. Even as he looked around, there didn't actually seem to be space on any of the tables scattered around the workshop and he wasn't sure if he wanted to place it on top of the array of tools and other items lying around.

"Yes, that'll be good. Just let me…"

Antonius headed towards the furthest table from the door, which had the least amount of clutter, and began clearing a space. When he was done, he motioned Steve over, patting the empty space for the shield.

Carefully, Steve picked his way across the workshop. Some of the things lying around on the floor looked like nothing he'd ever seen before and he didn't want to touch them, just in case. Then when he reached the table where Antonius stood waiting, Steve gently placed his shield on the tabletop. Antonius stepped closer immediately, a hand reaching closer to touch its surface, but stopped just short. The warlock's eyes were glazed over as if he was suddenly lost in thought, and they didn't seem to be very pleasant ones.

"You can touch it if you want to…?" Steve said carefully.

That snapped Antonius back to the present and the man's now-guarded eyes flicked over to regard Steve for a moment. Then a sudden smirk lit up Antonius' face and Steve could see clearly for himself the roguish charm that Antonius had used on Peggy (though it had not really worked) turned onto him.

"Thank you for the permission, Captain," Antonius drawled.

"Call me Steve, please."

"Then call me Tony, Steve."

Steve honestly did not have much experience with being flirted at, having been small, skinny and physically weak for most of his life. Perhaps he was getting better at reading the signs. Or he was just reading everything wrongly, but it seemed like the other man was flirting with him with how Antonius' voice had become slightly lower as he said Steve's name for the first time. It was a little unsettling to see Antonius' manner change so suddenly towards him and Steve really hoped that he was mistaken.

* * *

Tony was pissed. At himself. Maybe a little at the good Captain too, for being so polite and not calling him out on his reaction to the shield, which had to have been strange to the paladin. It had been implicit that he already had permission to touch the shield since Steven hadn't protested when he'd suggested a closer examination. Mostly though, the anger was self-directed and kept in check.

Howard wasn't even physically present, would probably never learn about this, and yet he had stopped before his hand had made contact with the shield because the locks that he'd kept on his childhood memories decided to choose that very moment to suddenly disintegrate.

"_I said that nobody except me was to touch the shield! __**Especially you, Anthony!**__ Leave my workshop now!"_

So many years had passed since he'd left his clan, and _still_ he was unable to step out of his father's long shadow in certain ways. It was pathetic. Then Steven had to kindly offer permission, which shook Tony out of his thoughts but also reminded him that someone else had seen him in a weak moment, even if it might not have been obvious. That made his defensive reflexes kick in fast, and after a split second's appreciation for Steven's niceness, he was flirting on automatic.

"Thank you for the permission, Captain," he drawled with a smirk on his face.

"Call me Steve, please."

"Then call me Tony, _Steve_," he replied, lowering the tone of his voice as he said the paladin's name for the first time. It was a nice feeling, interestingly enough.

Tony would not claim to be an expert at reading people, but he could tell that Steve had picked up on the flirting and it was making him a little uncomfortable. Well, Tony only had two types of defense mechanisms: insult or flirt. He'd probably defaulted to flirting because of Steve's looks (and yes, the blond was definitely rating very high on that front), plus the man hadn't actually gotten on his nerves. At least Tony hadn't been making blatant passes at Steve; Pepper would be disappointed if he'd ruined things by scandalizing the paladin when dinner had actually gone relatively smooth.

Deciding that he'd better move on to safer topics, Tony refocused his attention to the shield that was bare inches from his fingertips. With a last smile at Steve, he lowered his fingers to brush them across the metallic surface.

To Tony's relief, though he would never admit it, there was no sudden explosion or any other magical phenomenon when his skin contacted the metal. He honestly wouldn't put it past Howard to design some sort of a trap that activated when Tony handled it. Or possibly, the trap was no longer active since the shield had chosen its owner.

What were the chances that Tony would come into contact with the shield once that had happened?

In any case, Tony concentrated on examining the shield instead of pondering over that pointless question. It wasn't every day that one got their hands – literally – on Howard Stark's personal craft, and this was possibly his greatest work. Tony spared a moment to appreciate the irony that it was a shield, and not the varied weaponry that the Starks were renowned for, that had that particularly honored distinction before turning his thoughts back to less frivolous business.

He slowly slid the pads of his fingers over the curved surface, feeling the hum of magic imbued in the metal and the smoothness of the shield. There was nary a dent or scrape on its entire surface, despite the fact that Steve's party was sure to have met with fights and skirmishes before they'd reached his town. The protective magic cast on it had to have been potent. Tony wondered what other magic hid under this outermost layer.

Spreading his fingers out wide and flat, he pressed his entire right palm onto the center of the shield while his left hand continued to gently caress the rim of the shield. Tony shut his eyes, concentrating on the layers of magical energy. He would probably never be able to correctly determine every single spell cast or even identify the nature of some of them, but Tony had practiced hard at this – far more than any warlock he knew or had heard of – and he wasn't going to pity himself for the fact that, for some reason, he hadn't inherited his family's magical aptitude.

Gradually, he began to sense the ripples and pulses of the individual spells. For the moment, he ignored the gently rippling auras that were characteristic of protective or healing spells and instead, concentrated on the stronger, heavier pulses present just beneath the surface. They didn't feel like straight-up offensive spells. Those he had the easiest times detecting as they resonated the most clearly with his chaotic raw energies, all contained within boundaries but just waiting, _waiting_ for the chance to burst forth and revel in their glorious, destructive and uncaring beauty.

Tony had once compared, in the privacy of his mind, sensing the explosion of contained power from one of his eldritch blasts to getting a rush of pleasure straight from his nerves from an orgasm. He'd never admit it to anyone else because it would lead to certain misunderstanding.

Contrary to popular belief based on his reputation, he did _not_ take pleasure in killing. His work on the battlefields had been due to both immature, impulsive decision-making and the fact that it made good, fast money. He'd desperately needed the money then, having resolved to break off ties completely with his family. He would've gotten the same pleasure had he just been aiming for blowing up inanimate objects.

He had to admit, though, that in battle, especially those with other mages involved, the release of power from other spells also made his nerves and otherworldly senses sing with sensation and that often left him elated. He had also, with time and experience, noted the differences between arcane and divine spells, generally much preferring the feel of the more volatile magic channeled by the arcane, even if they were nowhere near the level of chaos that he harnessed for his own use.

In its own way, the battlefield had been a beautiful, if macabre, place for him to practice attuning and refining his sensitivity to magical energy. Though he had now since retired from being a mercenary, he sometimes still felt an itch for adventure and perhaps the feel of the magical arts at work again.

* * *

Steve watched silently as Antonius ran his hands over the shield. The warlock seemed to have entered a trance-like state as he eyes closed and a slight crease furrowed his eyebrows. Steve wasn't entirely sure what Antonius was doing. He'd seen Peggy adopt somewhat similar expressions before when she was trying to uncover what magic resided in an object or an area, though she didn't usually physically touch the items. Yet warlocks were different from other spell-casters, and from what he knew, they weren't as adept at identifying magic and spells. He knew there were mages who did not consider warlocks as true spell-casters.

Then again, Antonius had proven to be very intelligent, charismatic and rather different from the typical warlock. Perhaps the most obvious difference was how he actually worked in his own workshop to craft weapons and armor. Not only was it an unusual skill for a warlock – or most spell-casters – to have, Antonius' craft was widely reputed in the northern midlands and north to be superb. It wasn't too far of a stretch to think that Antonius would be better at determining the magical arts than most warlocks.

It was rather fascinating to observe Antonius as he worked. Steve was even more certain that the man he'd met in that opulent dining room was only one facet of Antonius, perhaps the facet most people saw and assumed to be all there was to the man. But that was false. He'd noticed how Antonius' eyes had lit up when asking about the shield and Steve was inclined to believe it was because of Antonius' love for blacksmithing and appreciation of the forms of craft that had caused it.

Perhaps, Steve mused, that was why he'd agreed to Antonius' request despite his apprehension at having a virtual stranger handle the shield for any period of time, and when it was well within his rights to decline it. He was fairly sure that Peggy had been surprised when he'd agreed.

Then Antonius' eyes abruptly shot open and his hands withdrew from the shield. If Steve hadn't been observing the man, he would've missed the brief wince on Antonius' face.

"Are you okay?" he asked carefully.

Nobody had been hurt by the shield from just touching it as far as Steve knew, but after getting to know Howard Stark, he wouldn't have put it past the older man to have booby-trapped the shield in some manner. The mage loved his explosions a bit too much even at his age.

"Hmm? Oh yes, I'm fine, just fine!"

"You winced a little just now."

"You caught that?" Antonius said and from the way his brow creased a moment later, Steve knew that the other man hadn't meant to let that slip out.

"Yes, I did," he replied. "Nobody's gotten hurt by touching my shield before, though nobody's tried what you did too."

"You mean nobody's tried to figure out what secrets your shield holds? Analyze the magic in it? Seriously?"

"I… don't let many people handle it."

"So I'm an exception?" Antonius' lips curved into a smile that seemed a touch smug, but a little flirtatious all at the same time.

Steve felt his face heat up a little and prayed that it wasn't too obvious. Bucky used to tease him about being overprotective of his shield and he'd protested it then. But Steve privately thought that Bucky did have a point and he was going to stop embarrassing himself further by halting this train of thought.

"Peggy's taken a look before," he admitted. "She didn't have much of a reaction to the magic though she didn't take a very long time with it, but Lord Stark may have added something to it that might trigger something when-"

"When people who're less than pure and good try to extend their touch too far in," Antonius interrupted, his tone falling abruptly flat and cold.

"No, that's not what I mean," Steve quickly said, feeling slightly bewildered by the swiftness of Antonius' change in moods. "It's just that Howard has always been very invested in the shield, so he might've added a… personal touch to it. I'm sure it's not targeted towards anybody."

* * *

Steve's explanation was almost lost on Tony when the paladin called his father by name. It meant that Steve had gotten to know Howard well enough to use the man's name without any formality; Tony was sure that Steve would've stuck with calling Howard "Lord Stark" in all situations if that hadn't been the case.

This was doing nothing to help his blackening mood. Howard wouldn't be interested in Steve if he hadn't been chosen by the shield, and from the looks of it, Howard had taken enough of a liking to Steve that they were on a first name basis. Well wasn't that just nice?

"Trust me, a _"personal touch"_ from Howard Stark would've caused something to explode regardless of who'd touched it. This is far more selective for unsavory individuals. I'm just surprised that there _wasn't_ an explosion."

His foray into deciphering the magic in the shield had revealed to him that the strong, steady pulse of energy was that of innate Good even though he still couldn't determine the type of spell it was. And it was that energy which had shocked him, physically. Good did not play well with darker energies and a warlock's abilities tended to originate from darkness, Evil and Chaos, regardless of the warlock's own birth nature. Those energies resided in the warlock, able to always be detected in some manner, and this set apart warlocks from most anyone else because no matter how they'd try to change, those abilities would never leave and they'd always have a tangible association with Evil.

But those energies weren't as easily detected in individuals who did not immerse themselves in what those powers represented. Tony had rarely experienced the physical shock when analyzing items that were innately Good. There was the rational thought that Howard was _just that good_ in his spells that even if he hadn't set out to set up traps, they inadvertently became traps due to Howard's power. But Tony didn't accept that. His father rarely did anything without a purpose, especially when it came to things he was invested in. And Tony could personally vouch for knowing just how invested Howard had been when making this shield.

As a child, he'd seen his father being extremely busy when caught up in his inventing moods. But nothing, before or after, had even come close to the man's near-manic fervor when he'd been creating the shield. Tony had grown up without really experiencing affection from his father, and while it hurt, he had kind of gotten used to it. Yet that period of time had been different too.

Howard didn't really like it when Tony worked in the workshop, though he'd never been against it. Probably because that had been an aspect of the Stark lineage that Tony had managed to inherit splendidly even when he failed spectacularly at any kind of arcane magic. He was, however, banned from the workshop when Howard started work on this particular shield even when he swore that he wouldn't interfere with Howard's work.

"_I don't need you around to distract me, Tony. You're not allowed in here until I say so."_

As if he'd ever been a distraction when Howard never paid him any attention during the times they were both in the shop, working at opposite ends as far away from each other as they possibly could. As if Tony had actively sought attention from Howard inside the workshop.

(That was a lie. He always wanted his father to notice him, to approve of him. But that didn't mean that he hadn't given up on that childish notion years ago.

And maybe that was also a lie. _Maybe_.)

He hadn't kept away, though. Much as he wanted to win Howard's approval and please the man, curiosity and burgeoning rebelliousness in equal parts had driven him to sneak into the workshop to take a peek at the mysterious shield when Howard had been called away by pressing matters. Unfortunately, Howard had set up wards around the unfinished shield. Tony hadn't been able to touch it, and he'd been quickly found out by Jarvis, the family butler, due to the alarm wards. Jarvis had been quick to usher him out of the workshop, but it hadn't stopped Howard from finding out and punishing him the second he'd gotten back to the manor.

So Tony could not shake the feeling that Howard had decided to take drastic measures, especially once his warlock abilities had manifested. After Howard's shock had faded, he'd hidden himself away in the workshop for a few days, not even coming out for food. Tony used to think that Howard just didn't want to see his complete, utter failure of a son. Now, he wondered if Howard had been adding more protective measures to the shield instead.

He was broken out of brooding over his dark thoughts by Steve's voice, sounding just a little apprehensive.

"You sound as if you know Lord Stark well."

"Oh, so we're back to formalities? What happened to calling him "Howard"? That certainly sounded like you're extremely familiar with him," he retorted, his tone still unfriendly and a little disdainful.

Steve flushed slightly. Tony could tell that he was embarrassed, and just the slightest hint of confusion was showing in the paladin's blue eyes. Steve was probably wondering about his abrupt and nasty change in attitude. But while Tony knew logically that Steve had no idea that he'd stepped blindly into a warzone littered with extremely sensitive mines, he just couldn't stop himself from lashing out.

"I… I just… He's like my mentor, that's all."

"Mentor? The Starks are mainly wizards, with the occasional sorcerer. I fail to see how he'd mentor you."

Tony knew that his dismissive, snide tone was getting to Steve from the way the beginnings of a frown were turning down the corners of the paladin's lips.

"He didn't really mentor me in magic, but there were many other things that he was knowledgeable about."

Steve was still trying to be polite. Not many people were able to keep their cool when Tony was being abrasive, be it deliberately or not; but at this moment, he wasn't able to appreciate it. If Howard had been able to teach Steve anything, then Tony certainly had no idea what it could be. Howard had barely spared any time for him as a child, and what little guidance he'd received from his father had been on metalworking. He honestly doubted that that was what Steve had supposedly learned from Howard, and if anybody mentioned morals, he was going to blast them, consequences be damned.

"Really?" he said with a raised eyebrow. Then he gave Steve a thorough, deliberate onceover before adding on with an obvious leer, "Well, unless you meant mentoring in the fine art of bed-"

The punch blindsided him. It was not merely the force of it, which had sent him sprawling onto the ground, but how he hadn't seen it coming until hard knuckles connected with his cheek. Steve had moved so. Damn. Fast.

Well, he probably deserved that and he didn't think he was going to get up of his own accord anytime soon. The rest of his body ached from the sudden, unwelcome contact with the hard floor and he was going to have a remarkable bruise on his left cheek. He was lucky that he hadn't landed on his tools or whatever else he had lying on the floor, of which many were sharp, pointy and possibly explosive all at the same time.

From his prone position, Tony looked up at Steve. The blond was glaring down at him, face red with anger this time, as he used his height advantage to loom over Tony's form.

"Don't you dare imply such a thing! I don't know why you dislike Howard so much, but you will not insult him in this manner!"

It wasn't the brightest of moves, but Tony couldn't stop the bitter laugh that escaped him. Of course Steve didn't know why he disliked Howard, to put it mildly. Nobody outside the Starks, Pepper, Rhodey and Natasha would know. It was also very unlikely that Steve would ever learn about it from any of them. The Starks would deny his existence and they had never been the type to air their dirty laundry in front of outsiders no matter how close a friend of the family the person may be; nobility was well-versed in the art of putting up a happy, harmonious front regardless of the true state of affairs. The other three people who knew would not tell anyone else. Keeping Tony's identity a secret was one of the few things they'd all ever agreed on (even if it might be for different reasons) without question, and so by extension, was everything that was too close to his past.

As for insulting Howard, it was a little interesting how Steve read it the way he had rather than an insult to the paladin himself. It could certainly have been taken that way, and Tony wouldn't have found it strange. Was Steve really that uncompromisingly good?

"Why Captain, I didn't think you had it in you to hit an unarmed man," he drawled instead, despite the sharp pain that lanced through his nerves from moving his jaw and how he was in a more vulnerable position.

Steve's eyes narrowed. "What you are implying… You're not unarmed, Lord Antonius. You could strike at me even now, lying on the ground."

"I implied nothing, Captain. And you think too highly of me," he replied, his tone of voice innocent in the manner that never could deceive Pepper or Rhodey (he didn't even try with Natasha).

It seemed that it wasn't working on Steve either.

"You know your reputation better than anyone else, and I'm starting to think that there was no exaggeration involved. You deal out death as easily as you breathe."

"More compliments, Captain? How kind of you."

"It was _not_ a compliment!"

"But I see it as one. Everyone's different. Uniquely good at something. I happen to be uniquely exquisite at killing," Tony replied with a sharp, shark-like grin that belied his true feelings.

Let Steve think that he was proud of his reputation, that there was truth in everything that was being said about him. It was true, Tony was _good_ at killing. Not in the way that Natasha could do assassinations clean and quick while leaving no trace of herself, but there had been a very good reason why he had been so sought after as a mercenary and he was not so out of shape now that he could not be lethal if he had to. There was also no doubt that he was still involved in snuffing out life even after his retirement. There was no way to know for certain where all the weapons his blacksmiths made went, to people who just used them to defend and protect or to people who actively looked to cause destruction.

But he didn't like it. He didn't revel in knowing how people feared him. He had long since accepted the fact that just because he was a warlock, he would always be feared by others on some level. That still didn't mean he had to like it, and it didn't mean that he really took pride in it. Because in the end, he still hadn't walked out completely of his father's shadow, of his father's utter rejection of who he was.

He'd commit suicide before letting Steve know though.

The look of disgust on Steve's face in response to his deliberately inciting words was not unexpected, though no less hurtful for it. He gingerly began to sit up, warily eyeing Steve just in case the paladin decided to take another shot at him – verbal or physical. Considering the almost-venomous way Steve was still looking at him, Tony expected at least a verbal assault.

Steve opened his mouth and Tony braced himself for what would come out next. However, he never found out what Steve wanted to say because there was a perfunctory knock on the workshop door and then Pepper strode in.

"Tony? Do you have a minute? If you're serious about going with…" Pepper started before trailing off as she took in the sight before her.

Tony was still sitting on the floor and he guessed that with how Pepper's eyes suddenly focused on his face, there had to be a bruise blooming across his jaw. Great. Someone was going to be in trouble, and chances were that it would be him.

"What happened?" she demanded, voice cool and gaze hard.

She was clearly meaning business and through the corners of his eyes, he could also see Steve straighten a little, as if responding to the sharpness of her tone. Tony mentally sighed in his head. He did not want to let Pepper know the true reasons, nor did he feel like enduring another lecture, especially not in front of an audience. So much for not breaking his promise to Pepper. He did not think he could escape the lecture entirely, but he could hopefully make it so that Steve would leave of his own accord immediately.

"Oh it's nothing, we just had a minor disagreement," he answered, getting to his feet swiftly and stepping towards Pepper.

"Really."

"Yes, really," he said firmly, hoping that Steve would get the hint and leave.

To his relief, he heard the sound of the paladin moving behind him and then a slight scrape that signified that Steve had taken hold of his shield. Then there was movement before Steve appeared in his peripheral vision. The blond was no longer looking angry, but there was a slight strain to the smile he had on for Pepper. A childish part of Tony gloated that Steve was having a hard time trying to appease Pepper too.

"Pepper, we just had differing opinions. I'm sorry if we startled you," Steve said. Then with an incline of his head, the other man bade them both goodbye and hurriedly retreated from the workshop.

As soon as the workshop's doors closed, Pepper rounded on Tony like he expected that she would do. He quickly held up his hands in an appeasing gesture.

"Now, now Pep, you heard the good man. We just had a minor disagreement."

"You do not end up on the ground with a bruise on your face because of a _minor _disagreement. I want the truth Tony. What happened?"

He had time to idly muse that at least Pepper hadn't automatically assumed that he was to blame. He wouldn't have faulted her if she did though. Then Pepper's glare became just that side of don't-make-me-force-you-Tony and the next thing Tony knew, he found himself spilling his guts to her. He told her how he'd recognized Steve's shield, that the shield was made by Howard and how he had provoked the paladin because of his issues rearing their ugly heads. He still had enough presence of mind to hide as much as his self-esteem issues from her though. Nevertheless, by the end of his little spiel, Pepper's expression was a lot more sympathetic.

"Oh Tony…" she sighed.

"Yeah well, I guess it's kind of my fault to begin with."

"He shouldn't have hit you regardless," Pepper defended him fiercely with conviction and Tony knew that he loved her best for a reason.

"It's fine, Pep. I probably hit his berserk button or something. You know I excel at doing that, consciously or not."

Pepper smiled wryly in acknowledgement of his point and Tony counted that as a win.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 3_

In the end, Tony still decided to join the traveling party despite the argument with Steve the night before (and he even completed the improvements to Clint's bow!). He could get his priorities straight and be mature, contrary to what Pepper and Rhodey liked to say about him. Shutting down HYDRA was not going to be achieved with just the trio, no offense to their capabilities. He was, yet again, unsurprised that Natasha had elected to go along as well, though that was because he suspected that Pepper and Rhodey would not have been as accommodating of his decision if their spymaster wasn't going to be present. No matter how many times he had insisted that he could take care of himself, his two closest friends still worried.

Pepper, perhaps, was more worried than usual since she had managed to squeeze the truth out of him regarding the confrontation between him and Steve the previous night. But Tony had the feeling that as long as he and Steve weren't left to their own devices, they'd be okay. He highly doubted that Natasha hadn't gotten wind of the situation and would thus know not to leave him alone with Steve as far as was possible.

Thus, it was a group of five (six, if he counted Clint's hawk companion that he was introduced to) that left Tony's mansion, with Pepper and Rhodey bidding them farewell and good luck. In private, Pepper and Rhodey had made him promise that he would return in one piece and not pull reckless stunts. Tensions in the group had been somewhat high in the initial days, and it had not been just between him and Steve. There was a definite strain between Clint and Natasha because there clearly had been issues left unresolved between them when they'd parted ways. It seemed that little talk the night before they left had not been a cure-all. Comparatively though, they'd worked it out quite fast. Tony had privately speculated whether sex had been involved but knew better than to voice it aloud.

In the end, Tony wasn't sure what had actually changed over the days he'd spent journeying to HYDRA's northern base with Steve, Peggy, Clint and Natasha. After the disastrous turn of his workshop meeting with Steve, they had stayed barely civil at the best of times and outright squabbling at the worst – even in the presence of mediators. He supposed that he should be grateful that Steve hadn't punched him again.

It _really _smarted.

What was honestly incredible, though, was how he and Steve worked together flawlessly in combat even when they normally couldn't get along. It was like, in battle, all their hostility towards each other melted away and they were able to naturally work side-by-side, effortlessly moving to cover each other with barely any verbal or non-verbal cues. One of the more spectacular moments of their teamwork had led to a group of HYDRA soldiers, who had been attempting to sneak up on Tony, being knocked out by Steve using his shield to reflect Tony's blast of power behind the warlock's back to hit the soldiers. So somehow, that ability to work together in combat started to translate out of battle.

Honestly, Tony found it hard to stay mad at Steve when he wasn't deliberately bringing up Howard. The good paladin was really _just that good_ and _honest_ and _sincere. _It was hard to dislike Steve, much less hate him, even if Tony sometimes wondered how the man was actually _real. _Other paladins that he'd encountered (and thank goodness there hadn't been many) had taken a look at him and instantly wrote him off; and they were all pompous assholes in Tony's opinion.

Therefore, to conclude, only the truly evil would be unable to stand any aspect of Steve. Since Tony wasn't truly evil, he therefore did not fall close to any category of people who would dislike Steven Rogers.

While it was reasonable for Tony to be unable to dislike Steve, the converse was not at all true. Tony was well aware of his character flaws (even if he acted like he was above the rest of humanity most of the time), had heard them all from Howard far more times than he'd like to admit. Not many people liked him, and even without his reputation or the stigma of being a warlock, Tony's personality wasn't easily likeable. The fact that he had Rhodey and Pepper as his only friends for the longest time spoke volumes. And he still didn't understand why they stuck with him.

Especially Rhodey who had seen him at his worst, entirely drunk and a general wreck on the night they'd first met. He could understand why Rhodey had saved him from being mugged; he just didn't know why the man stuck around _after. _As for Pepper, she'd stayed after he and Rhodey had saved her from being mugged or worse. Pepper had insisted on repaying him at the time, but by this time, years after that incident, Tony knew that she'd more than repaid her debt. She had all the right to leave, and yet she hadn't. She had instead chosen to stay beside him and help him manage his town and his business with such efficiency that Tony sometimes felt as though she ought to own them both.

In short, Steve had the right idea in disliking him and Tony didn't understand why that notion was changing on Steve's part. True, Steve was still more formal towards him than he was towards any of the others in their traveling party. He'd stopped calling him "Lord Antonius", but unlike the others, Steve still wasn't calling him "Tony" and persisted with calling him "Antonius".

Then came the day when he realized just how far Steve's thoughts had changed with regards to him.

* * *

Natasha and Clint worked well together, a fact that Tony hadn't been overly surprised about. What he had guessed about Natasha and Clint's history hadn't been confirmed by either of them, but he was fairly sure they'd done some work together in the field of subterfuge. Clint may claim to be a hunter (and it was probably true), but nobody could be able to shoot to incapacitate as well as Clint could without having training, experience or both. It was far, _far _easier to just shoot to kill. And when Clint _did _shoot to kill, he _never_ had to waste a single arrow.

Anyway, this meant that their little party was pretty well-rounded in terms of skill sets, and that made them all the more effective for it – even if Tony _was _probably a little rusty, not that he would acknowledge that aloud, compared to the rest of his party.

It _had_ been a while since Tony had used his warlock powers so often in such a relatively short period of time. He had never told Rhodey or Pepper about why he wanted to retire from the battlefields. Well, he hadn't lied per se, but he hadn't told them the complete truth either. He _had _been getting tired of life on the battlefield, although it had undeniably been quite profitable and was something that he did well almost effortlessly. Not to mention it gave him the opportunity to freely experiment in creating weapons and armor.

But one day, during the lull between finding, well, waiting to be found by another lord or nobleman who required his services (he'd gotten _that _good), he had gotten… cursed. A curse which would weaken his heart the more he used his warlock powers and would, in the end, be the death of him. It had been a more fast-acting curse, but due to a timely intervention and sacrifice by another wizard, the effects had been partially mitigated. To this day, Tony still did not understand why Yinsen had done this for him, made such a sacrifice for a near-stranger.

For a time after, he had searched for a way to fully break the curse, but to no avail. Therefore if he couldn't break it, he decided that he should retire from the frontlines and push up his plans for the future to the forefront. He was not planning to waste Yinsen's sacrifice. It helped that he met Pepper soon after that particular decision, and she was the perfect person to help in the administrative side of setting up his business and the eventual management of the little town he'd acquired.

Leaving the battlefield had been a good decision though, even ignoring the reasons that had to do with the curse. Tony had always been an inquisitive person, always wanting to figure out how things worked. His interest was largely in magic and weapons and armor craft, largely due to the fact that he'd been exposed to these two aspects of knowledge since birth. But he'd also been interested in engineering and would generally study most scholarly things. Therefore settling down in one spot gave him plenty of time to engage in these side pursuits even as he started his main blacksmithing business, which eventually included being the mayor of a town that just grew up around him and his business.

Still, it hadn't been a difficult decision to make to join Steve's group in journeying up north to thwart HYDRA. Much as scholarly pursuits and inventing filled up Tony's time, he could admit that part of him greatly enjoyed adventure and exploration, which he'd gotten during his time as a wandering mercenary. There was also the fact that he had been hearing more and more about HYDRA, or incidents that could be linked to the shady organization, with greater frequency lately. Much as Tony had made the bulk of his own fortune due to profiteering from battles, HYDRA's actions did not seem to be merely due to human greed and arrogance being put in action.

Well, perhaps arrogance was a given seeing as he was almost sure that HYDRA was also the cult of a powerful devil. Anything to do with underworld creatures walking on Earth was not a good thing as they usually meant to destroy, conquer or do a bit of both. The people who were involved with such cults were usually ambitious, arrogant, idiotic and generally a combination of all three. It was not anything Tony was looking forward to, and so if there was a way to weaken or eradicate HYDRA, Tony was quite willing to help in any way he could. He had seen haunting images in wars waged by humans with worldly desires and it was more than enough. He had no interest, not even on an intellectual level, to witness the scale of horrors a cult that worshipped a devil could unleash.

The strain of using his powers more frequently and for more strenuous purposes had been slowly building up over the past few weeks of traveling. But Tony was loath to make it known. It wasn't debilitating (yet) and he'd always hated admitting any sort of weakness. But logically, Tony knew that he wasn't going to be able to keep up much longer. So of course, with his luck, it had to happen when they were in the middle of storming another one of HYDRA's bases.

It was a small base but they decided to shut it down to slow the cult down. Regardless of HYDRA's motto, destroying any of their bases would definitely hinder their progression, if not revert it. The plan they'd worked out was to let Natasha and Clint infiltrate the base first to see if they could obtain any more information on the larger northern stronghold as well as anything that could help them in general. Then, the rest of them would only begin their frontal assault once the signal was given or when all hell broke loose.

All hell broke loose.

He'd felt it, a sudden tight feeling in his chest as he was flying above the rest of them. He considered temporarily refraining from using his powers, just until the feeling subsided. He had always been more comfortable with using his warlock abilities than firing actual ranged weapons, despite being proficient with most types of the latter category. But he quickly shot that idea to hell (no pun intended) when he spotted Clint surrounded by a group of enemies.

Clint could handle close-quarters combat, they had all witnessed it, but Tony wasn't taking any chances. There was also the fact that he couldn't see Natasha, Steve or Peggy anywhere near Clint's chosen perch, nor did they seem to have noticed Clint's predicament. That left it up to Tony to go to Clint's aid.

He swooped closer, gathering chaos energy in his hands and resolutely ignored the growing tightness that was morphing into pain. Releasing the bolts of energy, he picked off a few of the men surrounding Clint while diverting the attention of some of them towards him. He weaved around the arrows sent his way and then countered them. With lesser enemies to deal with, Clint soon cleared away the rest.

"Thanks!" the archer called up to him.

"Choose a less enemy-accessible nest next time!"

"This spot gave me the best angles and view. Gotta compromise sometimes," Clint replied with an unrepentant grin even as he loosed three arrows into the backs of three HYDRA agents without actually glancing in their direction. Show off.

"You just want to give us heart-"

It was at this moment that the pain in his chest abruptly intensified and he felt a sudden shortness of breath. Irony was a bitch. He could feel himself starting to lose altitude and forced himself to make it seem controlled. Ignoring Clint calling after him, Tony tried to concentrate on finding a safe spot to land. His actions, however, attracted the attentions of some of the enemies and arrows started flying in his direction. It was getting harder to maneuver in the air with the pain and blackness edging into his vision.

Just as he barely dodged an arrow, another burst of pain erupted from his chest and he couldn't maintain enough concentration for the invocation that was keeping him aloft.

_Steve is going to be pissed._

Then everything went black.

* * *

"_Tony!_" Clint's loud, frantic shout drew Steve's attention immediately.

A quick, hard swing of his shield took care of his opponents and Steve turned around just in time to see Tony fall from the sky.

For a moment, Steve was no longer in the present. He was back on the icy mountain ridge, watching Bucky fall into a deep, deep ravine, unable to move, unable to save his best friend. Then he snapped back to himself in the present, and without further thought, started sprinting towards Tony.

Logically, there was no way Steve would be able to make it there before Tony hit the ground. But logic wasn't driving Steve at this moment. It was fear. The fear of seeing yet another friend fall to his death while Steve was unable to do anything but watch the inevitable happen. That gave him speed he didn't know he possessed even after his body had changed. Still, every second that passed felt like too much time, precious moments that could be the difference between catching Tony before he hit the ground and failing to do so.

Steve did not realize it in his single-minded desire to reach Tony, but his path towards the warlock was unusually clear of enemies. Clint's shout had also alerted both Peggy and Natasha to Tony's predicament and all of them had seen the horror-struck look on Steve's face before the paladin started to run. Only Peggy understood just why Steve's reaction was what it was, but all of them made the decision to take out all the enemies between Steve and where Tony was falling towards. Not a single HYDRA man managed to get anywhere near Steve between arrows fired with deadly accuracy from Clint and Peggy, and swift lethal strikes from Natasha.

Tony disappeared from sight and Steve could hear the sounds of snapping tree branches, indicating that Tony was falling through the forest of conifers. They were slowing Tony's descent and while that was good, the snapping sound was making Steve think of breaking bones. That was not really something he wanted to contemplate right now. He put forth another burst of speed and reached a small clearing, in time to see Tony fall into the arms of another man.

Immediately, Steve tensed. The man wasn't dressed in typical HYDRA garb, in fact, Steve didn't think the man was wearing much of anything save a tattered green cloak, but that didn't mean he wasn't a danger to Tony.

The stranger looked up at him. "Is he your friend?" he asked slowly, his voice a rasp like he hadn't used it in a while.

"Yes," Steve replied cautiously, inching closer to the duo, still ready to react at any sign of hostility.

"I think you should come over and take a look at him. I'm not a healer," the man said. "And I don't bite," he added with a wry, perhaps even self-depreciating quirk of his lips.

Sensing nothing but honesty from the stranger, Steve went forward, slinging his shield on his back as he did so. With the other man's help, he carefully laid out Tony on the ground. He absently noted that the other man moved a distance away after that, but most of Steve's attention was on Tony's unconscious form.

Tony's face was unnaturally pale and his skin was clammy to the touch. There were scrapes and cuts on the unarmored parts of his limbs, the branches having ripped holes in the fabric of Tony's clothes. Steve couldn't see any sign of major external wounds, but that said _nothing_ about possible internal injuries. A spike of panic threatened to overwhelm him but he squashed it down ruthlessly. Tony didn't need him panicking. Panicking was the _last _thing he should be doing.

_I have him. Tony's here and still alive. It won't be like…_

Taking a deep breath, Steve called up the strongest healing spell he knew, with a few softly murmured words, his hand began to glow a soft pale blue and he hovered them over the abrasions on Tony's limbs. When they closed, he slowly worked his hands over to hover on top of the warlock's chest and set about sending the healing magic into the man's entire body.

Steve watched Tony intently, praying for him to regain consciousness soon. Yet when the spell had run its course, Tony was still unresponsive and only the barest of color had returned to the man's face.

Steve wasn't an expert on healing – that was Peggy's area – but this definitely wasn't a good sign. He hadn't seen what had caused Tony to fall, and perhaps that was the key. Or maybe… he just wasn't good enough. The panic he'd pushed to the back of his mind threatened to break out again and Steve hurriedly slammed a tighter lock onto his emotions. What he needed to do now was to get Tony to Peggy, she would know better.

"You're a paladin, aren't you?" the other man suddenly spoke.

Steve looked up from Tony, a little startled. He'd all but forgotten about the stranger who'd caught Tony. "Yes, I am."

"Paladins have another way to heal injuries that doesn't require spells, don't they? You should try using that, and focusing it on his heart."

"How do you know that that will help?"

"I'm not a healer, but I can sense magical energy. When you were using the spell earlier, the magic met with… _resistance_ around his heart. So I would think that's where the most damage would lie," the man explained calmly.

There was no harm in trying what the man suggested and Steve really didn't know if Tony could wait until Peggy arrived. Or even if it would be wise to move Tony. He was also more than a little embarrassed that he'd forgotten about the other way he could heal people. Perhaps emotion was still clouding his frame of mind more than it was probably acceptable when they were still in a tense, battle situation.

With no further hesitation, Steve worked on removing Tony's chest armor and unbuttoning the shirt the warlock wore underneath. For this to work, he needed skin-on-skin contact nearest the most damaged area since it was an internal organ he was healing. Then placing his bare hands on Tony's sternum, Steve concentrated.

Using this aspect of his paladin abilities had a limit to how much damage he could heal, although Steve hadn't found his yet despite having healed others before. He was basically taking the damage from Tony unto himself and letting his own enhanced healing handle it. He didn't take note of how long he stayed in that position, crouched beside Tony with his palms on unconscious man's chest, but he did start noticing a gradual but definitely increasing pain building in his own chest. Still, Steve persisted in maintaining contact with Tony. The heartbeat he felt beneath his palms had been weak at the start, and thought it was getting stronger, it was _still_ too weak for his liking. He wasn't going to stop until everything was set to rights.

"…hey, you should stop."

…

"-eve! Sto-"

"-it, he's not-"

_Please, please let me not be too late again._

* * *

Tony came awake slowly, and everything felt fuzzy and soft around the edges. It felt like he'd been sleeping for a long time and there seemed to be a gentle, soothing pulse flowing through him. Then the last memory he'd had flashed to the forefront of his mind and his eyes snapped open instantly.

He was greeted by the surprising sight of Steven Rogers bent over him. Before he could marvel at that surprisingly welcome sight, other sensations began flooding in. He noted that Steve's hands were on his chest and a white glow was surrounding the paladin's hands, and that appeared to be where that soothing pulse was originating form. Tony wasn't feeling any debilitating pain, or much of any kind of pain really. Taking in the paleness of Steve's face, his tightly scrunched shut eyes and how the other man was breaking into sweat, Tony realized with a fair amount of shock at what exactly Steve was doing.

"Steve! Stop! You're going to kill yourself!" came Peggy's worried voice.

Steve didn't even twitch.

"Shit, he's not hearing us," Clint said.

Even so, nobody tried to physically remove Steve from Tony. Tony recalled reading that contact shouldn't be broken abruptly as it would cause a backlash that would harm both the paladin and the patient. Well then, it looked like Tony had to do something before he had Steve's death on his hands. It wasn't a thought that he wanted to entertain in any capacity.

He raised a hand to grasp Steve's arm. "Hey, Captain."

Steve's eyes snapped open instantly (which was yet another surprise) and Tony read a brief moment of astonishment in them before relief overwhelmed that emotion in the paladin.

"Tony, you're…"

Tony put aside his own wonder at Steve actually calling him "Tony" to focus on getting the paladin to let go of him. There were better times for him to dwell on the name issue.

"I'm fine now, Ca- Steve. You can stop."

"You're… sure?"

The slight waver in Steve's voice along with the intense yet open look the blond had on him made Tony's stomach do a strange flip, and logically, there was no part of Tony right now that should be capable of acrobatics. Swallowing the little lump that seemed to have formed in and clogged up his throat, he replied to Steve's question and was impressed with himself at how his voice was actually completely steady.

"Very sure."

Steve gave him a careful, assessing onceover and if this moment wasn't so unusually intimate, Tony would've made a couple of wise cracks that would likely scandalize the other man and make him blush bright red. As it was, his brain was utterly devoid of even such thoughts. Instead, he stayed silent and fought against the urge to hold his breath. Wouldn't help him achieve his goal if Steve thought he wasn't breathing, would it?

Then as if he was finally satisfied that Tony wasn't lying and was truly all right now, Steve finally removed his hands. The glow surrounding them faded and then Tony started feeling a little ache in his chest. It was nowhere near blackout levels, but it was still there. He looked down at where Steve's hands had been and was very rudely reminded of the reason for his slowly failing heart. He wasn't sure if Steve had noticed, but the paladin's hands had been right on top of the circular curse mark.

Well, on the slightest chance that Steve _hadn't_ seen it… Tony quickly covered it up while making it look like was just sorting his clothes out.

By this time, the other three of their group had finally come closer. Peggy was fussing over Steve, chiding him for overextending himself. Clint, with Artemis perched on his shoulder, looked for all the world like he was standing guard over them all and Natasha was looking over Tony with a slightly pinched expression. Tony was getting the "I-see-through-all-your-trickery-so-you-better-not-have-been-lying" vibes from her and he really, _really _hoped her sharp eyes hadn't seen the mark during the short period when it was exposed. When Natasha's expression relaxed marginally, Tony felt that luck was probably on his side this time.

He began to sit up slowly, still feeling weak in his entire body. Almost instantly, Steve's hands were on his shoulder and back, steadying him. Tony wanted to be offended that Steve felt that he couldn't even manage to sit up on his own, really he did, but he just _couldn't. _Not when he'd witnessed how Steve had almost killed himself trying to heal Tony from what Tony was pretty sure was un-healable even with Good and Holy forces doing it. Even now, Steve was looking a little pale and he was hunched over slightly, an unnatural posture on the paladin. Steve had never looked this bad even after a hard day's travel peppered with skirmishes from HYDRA agents.

"You should lie down," Steve said.

"On the forest ground near HYDRA's base? Not even if you order me, Steve," Tony replied. Then he realized what he'd just said. "Wait, so you guys got the rest HYDRA? How long was I out?"

"We dealt with HYDRA," Clint replied, indicating himself, Peggy and Natasha. "Steve took off after you pretty much the second you started falling. You're lucky that he got to you in time."

Well, that was… even more surprising.

"I didn't really get to you in time," Steve said quietly, even as his face started turning a little pink. Then he turned a little, looking off to the side.

Tony followed the paladin's gaze and finally saw that there was a sixth person. The man looked as if he'd been caught slipping away, which he probably had been trying to do. He wasn't wearing much of anything other than a scruffy green cloak that had definitely seen better days, and if Tony wasn't mistaken, the man also had a number of faint scars on his limbs. There was also something vaguely familiar about this man…

"Um sir? I'm sorry for not saying this earlier, but thank you for catching Tony and your advice," Steve said.

The man gave a little laugh, "He just literally dropped on top of me. I didn't really have much of a choice."

It was at that point when Tony realized why he found the man familiar.

"You're Bruce Banner!" he exclaimed immediately. "You're a prodigy amongst wizards and also an esteemed scholar in both the divine and arcane arts. Then four years ago, you disappeared suddenly and haven't been seen since. Well, until now."

Banner appeared startled to be recognized but nodded, although wariness returned to his mien and he appeared a little tenser.

"What were you doing before becoming my cushion? Which, by the way, thank you very much for that," Tony asked, curiosity getting the better of him as he pretty much abandoned any last semblance of tact.

He was lucky that the others (well, not Natasha because she knew) hadn't started asking how he'd recognized Banner, though he could've probably given a reason that wouldn't give away Tony's own true identity. Tony had heard of and read about Bruce Banner as a child, seeing as the Starks were a wizardry clan. He'd actually seen Banner once from afar at a Stark ball cum wizards conference when he was in his early teens and Banner was just over twenty.

Tony remembered that the young man (at the time) had been the cause of quite the buzz amongst the old wizened mages, and well, everyone in attendance. Banner had been very young when he'd graduated from his school with top honors and everyone who was anyone important had been dying to meet him. Banner had stood out amongst the large gathering of people to Tony because the man had a vague air about him that said that he would rather be somewhere else, perhaps with his books so that he could _study_ and not bother with such social gatherings.

The sight had reminded Tony of himself a little, though Tony's reasons had been different. He would rather be tinkering with mechanics and metals or reading to expand his knowledge, and _not_ being in the stuffy ballroom where his only purpose was to smile and be polite whenever he had to be introduced to some important wizard or another by his father.

Besides, he was sure Howard never really wanted him there. It was just bad for the Stark name if the heir to the clan did not turn up, even if said heir didn't even have a single smidgen of magical finesse in him. Tony occasionally wondered how the clan had reacted when he'd ran away from them, but he never bothered to check what his official status with them was. He was sure Pepper still kept tabs on the Starks, but he never found the need to know about how they were faring and what their stance on their missing heir was. They certainly hadn't bothered to look for him when he'd pulled his vanishing act.

"…being HYDRA's prisoner. Your attack gave me the chance to escape."

"You spent four years as HYDRA's prisoner?!" Tony cried out in shock and outrage.

"No, I disappeared of my own will four years ago. HYDRA got me about a year ago," Banner clarified.

"Well, that's still not very nice. Glad the distraction we caused let you out as well," Tony said. Giving the man a critical glance, he asked, "Is that all you have?"

"HYDRA wasn't overflowing with hospitality, as you would imagine," Banner replied with a wry quirk of his lips. "They may have hidden my spellbook somewhere in the base, but I wasn't really thinking of it at the time."

A wizard's spellbook was literally the wizard's life. Tony knew that to be pretty much an absolute fact. Only really, _really _experienced wizards could survive without their spellbooks for an extended period of time. Even so, all wizards were extremely protective over their spellbooks and even if they could survive without one (or many), to Tony's knowledge, none of them ever willingly did so.

"Alright then, since we've cleared out the base of all its pests, let's go and see if we can find your belongings. It's the least I can do to thank you for breaking my fall."

As he spoke, Tony attempted to stand up. Steve's hand came up immediately to help him, but he saw that there was a tiny frown on Steve's face. Probably because Tony wasn't being a good nearly-died person and not exerting himself. But there was no way Tony was going to let himself be carried around by Steve, or anyone else for the matter.

"Tony…"

Mentally, he rejoiced at Steve once again calling him "Tony", but he did not let that sway his decision. "I'm not going to be carried around, Captain. I'll take it slow, but that's it."

"Fine," Steve acquiesced.

Tony only had a second to think that that went easier than he expected before Steve had moved to sling an arm around Tony's waist. Then, he was pressed up against Steve's side with most of his weight leaning onto the other man.

"Uh, Captain…?"

"I'll help you along, Tony. If you so much as try to object, I will _not _hesitate in picking you up and carrying you the rest of the way to the next town. Are we clear?" Steve said in his commander's tone that brooked no argument.

Perhaps it was because he was so close to Steve that he saw that behind the stern expression currently on Steve's face, there were lingering traces of fear still present in Steve's eyes. Reflecting on how Steve had almost died trying to heal him, Tony wondered just why Steve was being uncharacteristically worried and protective of him. It wasn't the first time any of them had gotten injured, though certainly nobody had come as close to dying as Tony did. Nevertheless, this behavior from Steve was a little foreign.

"Steve, I-" His words were cut off at a deceptively light touch to his right arm and he looked away from Steve to see that Natasha had come up next to him.

"I'm in agreement with Steve, Tony," Natasha said. Then with just the slightest but pronounced (to Tony's eye at least) sharpening of her gaze, she continued in the same quiet tone, "Pepper would be worried, otherwise."

That meant that Natasha would report back to Pepper about Tony's condition and the last thing Tony needed was having Pepper worry about him. Or perhaps even decide to come out to find him, if not, she would send Rhodey out and Rhodey was currently needed to make sure nobody decided to take advantage of Pepper without Tony around. He was sure that Natasha kept Pepper and Rhodey updated about their travels, and her presence was probably the only reason why Pepper and Rhodey had let him depart with Steve's party in the first place. Knowing Natasha, if Tony did not comply with Steve's admittedly not outrageous demands, she would definitely raise alarm bells with his two friends that did not need to be raised. Tony was _fine. _He was all sorts of levels of "fine".

"Right, no overexerting myself and I'm to let our fine paladin help me along. I understand," Tony said, giving way as graciously as he could manage, which wasn't really all that much, but hey, at least he wasn't throwing a tantrum or whining.

Once they started moving though, Tony directed his attention fully onto Banner and started engaging the reserved wizard in conversation. He was still curious about the circumstances surrounding Banner's disappearance and his capture by HYDRA, but he was even more interested to know more about the man and find out if they shared any common interests in the wide fields of knowledge.

He could admit to himself that a tiny part of him, a _really tiny _part of him was also seeking refuge in conversing with Banner so he wouldn't have to pay much attention to how Steve was holding him firmly to help him along, and yet still gently enough that it was like Steve didn't want to accidentally injure Tony. Today was a day full of revelations about Steve, and Tony decided that right now, it was just not the time for him to dwell on those shocking revelations.

Later would be a better time… a lot later.

* * *

As the group made their way back to the now-deserted base, Steve took the time to compose himself again. He probably looked fine, but his heart was still beating at a far higher rate than usual.

Tony was alive; Steve hadn't been too late. Part of him had even been _glad _for Tony's protests because that was _normal, _unlike when Tony had been too still, too silent before. Tony was now chattering away at Banner, sounding genuinely pleased to have found someone who shared his interests. Steve took comfort in listening to Tony's voice even if he did not understand all the magical theory that was being bandied about, as he did with how he was supporting Tony. He hadn't believed for a second that the warlock was fine, not when he could feel his own body still working to heal the injuries he'd taken upon himself from Tony. He was almost sure he hadn't removed all of Tony's damage to his heart, but there was no way to deal with that right now. Perhaps he'd try to convince Tony to let him check him over when they settled down for the night.

Soon, they were at the entrance to the HYDRA base and they let Natasha lead the way, with Clint bringing up the rear. Banner was beginning to look tense again, compared to when he'd relaxed a little as Tony was talking to him outside. Bad memories had to be rearing their heads for him. When the wizard had said that he'd been HYDRA's prisoner for close to a year, Steve too had felt shock and then outrage for Banner. He could guess why HYDRA had sought to obtain Banner's services – willingly or not – from Tony's earlier proclamations about the man's genius.

Natasha led them downstairs and through various corridors before stopping outside a nondescript-looking door. "This is where HYDRA appears to be holding all their valuable items and information from our scouting," she announced before pushing the door open.

Banner stepped inside and then instantly made a beeline towards the furthest corner of the room, as if drawn by something. It could very likely be the case. Tony made to follow the wizard, which left Steve going in the same direction. The rest of them fanned out across the room, seeking for more information that would be useful in finding out more of HYDRA's plans and thwarting them.

Banner then reached out to take hold of a thin book in a gleaming, metallic casing that was resting on a relatively empty bookshelf. When the man's fingers touched the case though, he hissed and snatched his fingers back as if burnt.

"Are you okay?" Tony asked, even as he reached for the book too.

Before Steve could warn him against handling the book due to what had happened to Banner, Tony had taken a hold of it and was perfectly okay.

"This is si…" Tony trailed off as he looked at Banner.

Glancing at Banner himself, Steve found himself tensing up instinctively. The aura around the soft-spoken wizard had changed, and Steve found himself in a situation akin to staring down a cornered wild predator.

Then wordlessly, Tony extracted the leather-bound book from the case and held it out to Banner. Banner stared at Tony for a long moment, his eyes wide. Then haltingly, the wizard reached out to take back his spellbook, his eyes never once leaving Tony. Once the book was safely with Banner, a flare of light came from Tony's palm and both Steve and Banner watched in surprise as the metal case disintegrated in Tony's hand.

"You…"

"Don't worry about it, Bruce," Tony said airily. "I can call you Bruce, can't I? I'm Antonius, but you can call me Tony."

"But…"

"No protests! Unless you object to me calling you Bruce?"

"No, no that's fine. Thank you… Tony," Banner replied with a slight smile that seemed to be the most genuine one that had appeared on the wizard's face since they'd met him.

Steve had no idea of what just transpired. He wasn't sure why Tony was able to hold the metal case without getting shocked, but figured that HYDRA had enchanted the case to prevent Banner from being able to access his spellbook on the chance that he escaped. That still didn't completely explain Banner and Tony's exchange though. As short as that had been, Steve felt that a very significant thing had occurred. He just didn't know what it could be.

"Well then, we've gotten Bruce's spellbook back," Tony said. "Anyone knows where his clothes could be?"

"Here," Peggy answered, walking up with a bag. Then to Banner, she said, "I'm not sure if it's yours, but it isn't HYDRA's uniform either."

Banner took the bag and peered inside. "Yes, these are mine. I'm surprised they kept them. Thank you, ma'am."

"Call me Peggy, Bruce." Then Peggy introduced the rest of them to the wizard.

* * *

Tony, having grown up experimenting and working with metals, had instantly identified by touch that the case Bruce's spellbook was in was made almost purely of silver.

"This is si…"

It hit him like a lightning bolt as his eyes widened in realization.

Bruce Banner was a Were.

This… this had to have been a relatively recent development and Bruce's own admission to having made himself disappear four years ago suddenly made terrible, terrible sense.

He looked at Bruce who was beginning to give off an aura of a wild animal a threatened and cornered one. He also vaguely noted that Artemis had been staying as far away from Bruce as possible since they entered the base while still attempting to keep close to Clint. Surely Artemis had instinctively taken note of the were-animal side of Bruce and it had to be a prominent predator for the hawk to be so wary.

A wave of sympathy and understanding washed over Tony. Bruce was waiting for Tony to drop the other shoe but he was doing no such thing. He understood all too well how prejudice affected people. Tony's own family had shunned him as soon as his warlock abilities manifested and he was met with fear – and even hatred – once other people knew about his powers.

Tony had gotten used to it eventually; gotten used to being feared and hated because of something he couldn't control and hadn't asked for. Bruce hadn't managed that, it was all too clear. Four years versus a lifetime. The wizard must have run almost as soon as he knew about his change. Tony wasn't about to let Bruce disappear again and live in fear and isolation though.

Much as he had insisted to Pepper and Rhodey that he'd be fine being alone, he knew it would've been a lie. Certainly he'd survive, but their presence had hit it home that it was really very nice to not always be alone. He'd also acknowledge that if not for Rhodey, and then Pepper, he might have given it all up the day he was cursed and decided to go out in a blaze of glory. Maybe it would've even been literal.

Wordlessly, Tony removed the spellbook from the silver case and held it out to Bruce. He kept his eyes on Bruce unflinchingly, hoping that the other man would read his sincerity in them. Tony was not good with words, not those meant to comfort and reassure anyway, so he hoped that in this case, his actions would speak louder, clearer. He was cheered when Bruce, albeit tentatively, reached for the proffered book. Then making sure that Bruce was still looking at him, Tony blasted the silver case into nothingness. The action caused a twinge of protest in his chest, but the happiness he felt at the look of wide-eyed surprise on Bruce's face eclipsed that minor ache.

"You…"

"Don't worry about it, Bruce," he cut in smoothly in a nonchalant tone, hoping this would further reassure the man that Tony would keep his secret. "I can call you Bruce, can't I? I'm Antonius, but you can call me Tony."

Bruce still didn't seem all that convinced. "But…"

"No protests! Unless you don't want me to call you Bruce?" Tony put in a deliberate, plaintive note into his voice.

"No, no that's fine. Thank you… Tony," Bruce replied with a small smile.

Tony read the wonder and gratitude in the man's eyes and couldn't help but grin as well. "Well then, we've gotten Bruce's spellbook back. Anyone knows where his clothes could be?"

Peggy stepped forward with what turned out to be actually Bruce's clothes and then introduced the rest of them to the wizard, something they hadn't managed to do since Tony had occupied Bruce's attention all the way to HYDRA's old base of operations. As they stepped out of the room to let Bruce have his privacy to change, Tony made a quick decision.

"Hurry out when you're done, Bruce! Then we can finally leave this forsaken place together!" he called over his shoulder as he exited the room.

"I… Okay."

Tony felt the grin on his lips widen a little further. He was fairly sure Bruce wouldn't pull a vanishing act immediately and if Tony had any say in it, he was going to make sure that Bruce wouldn't have to be alone again. Perhaps he'd be interested to stay with Tony when this was over. The mansion was certainly large enough to accommodate the wizard and the library was extensive…

"Tony, you're thinking of asking Bruce to join us, aren't you?" Steve spoke, breaking into his musings.

Tony blinked, turning to look at Steve. He was also abruptly reminded of their forced proximity when Steve's face showed up far closer to his own than usual. Nope, this was still _not _the time to contemplate the weird flip-floppy feeling in his gut.

"How did you guess?"

Steve shrugged, the action unwittingly drawing Tony closer to the paladin and no, Tony was not focusing on that, not at all.

"Gut instinct mostly," Steve replied. "But there's also how the two of you got along almost instantly from the start."

"Well, it'd be useful to have a proper offensive spellcaster on the team too," he hedged, unwilling to prove Steve right so easily.

"That may be true but I think all of us saw it coming when you wouldn't stop talking with Bruce," Peggy added with an amused smile.

Tony was saved from thinking of a suitable reply when Bruce came out of the room, dressed. It wasn't as though Tony could really refute Peggy's words either. He briefly wondered when he'd become so easily readable to these people (Natasha not included), before quickly abandoning the thought and turned to Bruce instead.

"Done primping, Bruce?" he asked as he took a look at Bruce's attire.

The shirt and pants on the wizard had _definitely _seen better days, and there was no need to mention the green rag of a cloak. Tony couldn't decide if the state of Bruce's clothes was due to HYDRA's negligence or the years Bruce had spent in hiding. It was probably both. Tony tsked.

"Right, the first thing we need to do at the next town is get you proper clothes, big guy," he announced. "And shoes," he added after glancing down at Bruce's feet.

"Tony, there's no-"

"Don't worry about the money, Bruce. I won't even miss it. Just ask any of them, they've seen my _town_."

"And his mansion too," Clint piped up. "I was disappointed at the lack of a golden throne though."

"In due time, my good man," Tony replied easily. Then to Bruce, he added, "Bruce, you need hardier clothes and shoes when you travel with us. The mountain ranges we're heading to require sturdier stuff."

"You want me to travel with you?"

"Of course! The others are all for it too. Unless you don't want to, in which case you can stay at my mansion and be pampered by luxury."

Bruce blinked, and then slowly replied, "I'll join you."

"Fantastic!"

And _that_, was a job well done, if Tony didn't say so himself.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 4_

When they finally reached the nearest village, it was close to sunset. True to his word, Tony hustled Bruce, and thus Steve (though by this time, Tony had negotiated with Steve into hovering nearby instead of physically supporting him), into the nearest clothing store to get the wizard new clothes. The remaining three of the group volunteered to settle their lodgings for the night.

As Tony rattled off a long list of items, with Bruce protesting the necessity of a good number of them, to the delighted shopkeeper, Steve watched with a small smile and reflected ruefully that he'd been wrong about Tony after their disastrous one-on-one meeting in the workshop. He had slowly comprehended that fact over the weeks since Tony had joined them.

While Tony could most certainly be charming, he could also be annoying and abrasive, but Steve now recognized that it was mostly a front, a mask that hid the real Tony from the rest of the world. Tony was kind and caring in his own way, working on ways to improve their weapons and armor whenever they had downtime. The only exception to that was Steve's shield. Tony hadn't even asked to look at it again and Steve hoped he wasn't reading too much into the possible reasons for that. In battle, Tony was always looking out for them in the air, sometimes a little too recklessly. His actions during combat had been a rather common feature in their early arguments. Then today with Bruce, Tony hadn't had a second thought about buying the wizard better clothes despite only having just met the man.

They'd gotten off on the wrong foot and Steve hoped that he could start anew with the warlock. Tony could've died today and Steve would've lost a friend before he could even apologize. He had things to apologize for and it started with the first punch he threw at Tony back in Tony's workshop. He'd been angry, nevertheless, he shouldn't have done it. To date, he still didn't understand the near-vitriolic hate Tony had for Howard Stark, but it was definitely a sore topic that Steve now avoided. Hopefully, he would get the chance to apologize later today. He then turned his attentions outwards.

"Tony, that's more than enough. I wouldn't know what to _do_ with this much clothing," Bruce said, sounding a little harried at the veritable stack of garments in the shop assistant's arms that was still growing as the shopkeeper added more things to it per Tony's instructions.

Steve noted that a good portion of the clothing held by the shop assistant were sensible, if slightly more fanciful, ones suitable for long-distance traveling. There were also sturdy looking coats and some furs for harsher, cold climates.

"Nonsense, Bruce. There's no such thing as too much clothes. Besides, they may get damaged," Tony replied.

The duo exchanged a look, and then Bruce's shoulders slumped a little and he shrugged slightly. "All right, if you insist, Tony."

"I definitely do," Tony declared with a satisfied smirk. Then to the shopkeeper, he said, "We're taking all of these. Wrap them all up!"

"Yes, sir! Thank you, sir!"

The trio exited the shop to find that night had properly fallen. Clint was leaning against the outer wall of the shop and he straightened up once all of them were out.

"Took you long enough," the archer commented. "Did he buy the entire shop for you, Bruce?"

"Thankfully, no. But it was close."

"We still need shoes for Bruce," Tony added.

Clint groaned. "Really, Tony, aren't you even the least bit tired? Don't you want to get some _rest?_"

"Well, I'm sorry that your stamina's lacking, Clint," Tony replied, sounding not the least bit sorry.

"Clint's right," Steve quickly interjected as it appeared as though Clint and Tony were about to start hurling thinly-veiled, if at all, sexual insults at each other in public. "You've had a long day, Tony. It'd be best if you rested."

"If that's the case, Captain, then you need rest too," Tony replied archly. "I remember Peggy scolding you for overexerting yourself. I don't think you'd want to piss her off."

"If I say that I'm tired too, will you go back to the inn now?"

"Tony, you really should rest," Bruce interjected as well. Then, as if to appease the disgruntled-looking warlock who looked on the verge of a full-out pout, he added, "We can get shoes tomorrow?"

Tony sighed dramatically. "Oh fine, I'm outnumbered as it stands. But we _are _getting shoes for you tomorrow, Bruce. Do _not _think you can even attempt to escape it!"

Bruce nodded his agreement while Clint gave a whoop of joy at not having to wander to yet another store to wait for Tony to finish his shopping spree for Bruce. Then with the archer leading the way, the four of them made their way back to the inn where they'd be staying in for the night, and possibly for a few more days after. Steve figured that both Peggy and Natasha would have had the foresight to rent the rooms for a few more days due to today's events, and so he wasn't too worried about that. Possibly the only problem was getting Tony to acknowledge that even though he was up and about now, that did not mean he was completely hale and hearty again and that rest was most definitely required.

There was a brief disagreement over the sleeping arrangements after dinner was settled. The women of the group were naturally having a room to themselves, although they had made do with sharing with the rest of the group when sufficient lodgings had been scarce in the past. That left how the remaining four of them were to split themselves up.

"Right, I'll take a room with Bruce," Tony said. The warlock made to head to one of the rooms allocated to them when he suddenly stopped short.

Steve did not realize what he'd done until Tony said, a little uncertainly, "Uh, Steve? You might want to let go of my wrist?"

That was when he realized that he'd unconsciously snagged a hold on Tony when the man had said he was going to room with Bruce. Steve blushed a little. He knew the reason for how he'd subconsciously acted. He was still affected by having seen Tony almost die in front of him and right now, it seemed that he needed to have Tony physically near him so that Steve could see that Tony was really all right.

"S-sorry Tony… but I uh… I think I'll sleep better if you'd room with me… tonight?"

Tony blinked at him, looking taken aback. Even Clint was staring at Steve.

"Sorry, I know it's… kind of stupid… but… I saw my best friend fall to his death right in front of me and… I… today…"

"Yes, well… Okay, sure Steve. I… we can share a room. I bet you just want to mother hen me, don't you?" Tony said, adding a weak-sounding joke at the end.

"So I guess we'll take the other room then, Bruce," Clint said, a little loudly to cover up the rather uncomfortable (strangely intimate maybe) moment between Steve and Tony.

"Yes, of course. See you later, Tony, Steve," Bruce replied as he hurried past Tony and Steve to the room he would be sharing with Clint.

"Don't forget we have to get you shoes tomorrow!" Tony called after Bruce just before the door closed.

Then it was just him and Tony standing awkwardly in the middle of the corridor, and Steve realized he was _still _holding onto Tony. He quickly let go of the other man's wrist and moved over to push open the door to their room, gesturing for Tony to enter first. Silence surrounded them again once they'd both entered the room and Steve had closed the door. Steve was beginning to think that he probably shouldn't have asked to share a room with Tony, nightmares be damned. Surely Tony would feel more comfortable around Bruce than around him. They weren't exactly _friendly _towards each other prior to today.

He figured he should start with apologizing to Tony. Maybe it would break this awkward atmosphere.

"I'm sorry," Steve all but blurted out, making sure that he was looking at Tony, although the man wasn't looking in his direction.

Not for long though. As soon as his apology graced the air around them, Tony had jerked a little as if startled and then proceeded to look at Steve. Shock was evident on the man's face from his wide eyes and the slightly open-mouthed expression on his face. Steve decided that he should barrel on before Tony could get in a word edgewise.

"I mean it, Tony. That day in your workshop, I shouldn't have punched you and then said all those things about you. I… I was wrong about you Tony. Working with you for the past few weeks made me realize that, but I was just… just unable to apologize to you before today. When I thought you were going to die, I was afraid I'd lose another friend again while I was helpless to do anything but watch it happen. So, I… I'm sorry, Tony."

Tony continued gaping at him for a few more seconds before the man shut his eyes and ran a hand over his face. "Jeez, Steve! Why, why are _you _apologizing? And for something that happened so long ago? I was being an asshole that day, though I guess you could say that's how I usually am. The point is that I should be the one apologizing, okay? I didn't make it easy for you to like me. I… I guess I'm sorry too that I brought back bad memories for you."

"No, Tony you don't have to apologize for that. You couldn't have known about Bucky. I probably overreacted as well, but when it seemed that I couldn't heal you, I really feared the worst."

"Steve, you almost _killed yourself _trying to heal me! Just… just don't do that again."

He laughed shakily. "Well, that should be my words to you. Try not to fall out of the sky without warning after today, okay?"

Tony smiled genuinely and gave a jaunty little salute. "Aye, aye Captain!"

Steve was glad to see that they would definitely be able to move past their rocky beginning. But there was still one more thing that he had to know, although it was going to be intrusive. "If you don't mind me asking, what happened to you during the fight, Tony? It's just… well if it's something we could prevent, it might be useful to know in the future."

Immediately, Tony's expression became guarded but the warlock didn't seem to be getting angry at Steve for prying. When he finally spoke again though, Tony's words weren't what Steve had ever expected.

"I… have a heart problem. It just… acted up during the fight earlier."

"A heart problem?" Steve echoed. "Then… then are you okay now?"

"Well, if you're asking if my condition is completely cured, that's going to be a no. _But_, before you become all worried, I've lived with this for years already. I can manage it. You don't have to be worried."

"But…"

"Steve, I can handle myself. I just haven't been adventuring in recent years, so that probably hit me harder than usual. I'll be fine. It won't happen again," the warlock reassured him.

Steve was still a little dubious, but he did not want to alienate Tony just when they were beginning to become really friends. He nodded in concession to Tony's words but privately vowed to keep a closer eye on Tony, just in case.

"Alright, but you should still rest early today. You're going to be out getting shoes for Bruce tomorrow, aren't you?"

Tony rolled his eyes but it was all in good humor. "Yes, yes. See, I knew you just wanted to fuss over me!"

* * *

The next morning, Tony made good on his promise to buy better shoes for Bruce to replace the pathetic excuses he had. At the same time, it was also a quick escape from Steve, who had thankfully deemed him well enough to not collapse just by walking around shoe shopping. It wasn't that he didn't like how he and Steve had sorted things out but talking about the curse, even indirectly, was not something he had ever done, even though he still hadn't brought himself round to telling Steve the truth.

Either way, he was still feeling just a little vulnerable around Steve, even though he knew logically that there was nothing he needed to worry about. But ever since their first encounter, Steve had always seemed to know how to strip him to the bone and vulnerability was not something Tony dealt with well. So, much as he rejoiced over making up with Steve and looked forward to becoming better friends, right now he need to feel just that least bit vulnerable. Besides, he could already foresee becoming great friends with Bruce because of their common interests in the magics and science.

So Tony was quite unprepared to be ambushed by Bruce's startling insight. The day started out normally enough with him haranguing Bruce about appropriate, travel-worthy footwear. It was _important_ okay? Especially since the wizard was going to travel with them and ice was a big issue up north.

Bruce, he noted, didn't fight as hard as he did the previous evening. Tony put that down to the wizard already knowing that it would be next to impossible to dissuade him. Bruce was a smart man and that should probably already have given him some warning that it was entirely possible that said man would've figured out his secrets.

They were sitting on a bench in the small village square, munching on street food, when Bruce finally spoke, his tone hesitant but with determination evident in his expression.

"Tony, I don't really know how to phrase this properly, so if you don't mind, I'll just speak plainly."

"Sure. What is it?"

"I know that you have a curse that damages your heart and I think your name isn't really Antonius, is it?"

Whatever he had expected Bruce to say, it certainly hadn't been all that. Tony was stunned and all he could do was look at the other man blankly. Or he hoped it was blankly, frankly, he had no idea what his face was doing right now. His gut began to churn and on some level, he could feel the stirrings of Chaos energy gathering around him as his fight-or-flight responses engaged. He _hated _feeling vulnerable and Bruce had seen through him so quickly.

How did Bruce know? Two secrets that Tony had been keeping from everyone else in the party, especially the one about his curse. Not even Natasha, Pepper nor Rhodey knew about that, though he was sure that if Natasha studied even the slightest bit about the magical arts, she'd figure him out in an instant.

Then Bruce laid a hand gently on his shoulder. "Tony, relax. I'm not going to hurt you. Why you chose to hide your identity is your prerogative, and if you don't want to tell me, I'm not going to press. But your curse…"

"What… what about it?"

"It's old, isn't it? Why are you still out on this quest then? You would know better than I do what it actually does, wouldn't you?"

"I… How did you find out about that?" Tony tried to deflect and from Bruce's expression, he knew that Bruce knew what he was doing. Still, the wizard played along.

"I caught you, remember? It all happened quite fast but I thought I felt some sort of dark magic. Then I witnessed Steve attempting to heal you. I could feel that the healing energy met with some resistance around your heart and then I could detect that there was dark magic, a curse, at work."

"I see…"

"So why are you still out in the field, Tony? Do you-"

"No!" Tony immediately protested, having figured out what Bruce's question was. "I swear, I'm not suicidal and I don't have a death wish. I honestly thought that they needed all the help they can get to take down HYDRA and if HYDRA succeeded in whatever it is they're doing, it would affect many, many people. I… I just don't want that to happen."

"Fine, but does anyone know? I know that Steve didn't-"

He didn't mean to interrupt again, but he was suddenly hit with a thought and had to clarify with Bruce. "Wait, Bruce. Does Steve know now? Could he have figured it out like you did?"

"I think that from what I've seen of Steve, if he figured it out, you would already know that. But when he was healing you, he was almost panicking and I had to point out to him to heal more of the damage surrounding your heart. So, he could have figured it out, but I don't think he was in a state of mind to do so then."

Tony sagged back against the bench back in relief. Now that he was slightly calmer, he knew that Bruce was right. If Steve had found out about the curse, he would've mentioned it sometime last night when they were having their talk.

"Does anyone else know though, Tony?"

"…no?"

Bruce gave him a Very Disapproving Look. Tony wondered if it was a good idea for him to meet Pepper and Rhodey.

"It's… it's just private, okay? And I swear that what happened yesterday was because I just wasn't used to using my powers so intensively in a concentrated period of time in a while. I retired from the mercenary scene because of it, you know. I know my limits, Bruce. _Really._"

"You seem like the type to push them, though."

"Just trust me on this and don't tell the others?"

Bruce gave him a long look, during which Tony fought _not _to squirm like a misbehaving child caught red-handed, before Bruce sighed and nodded in acquiescence. "Be careful, okay?"

"I will. Promise." There was a moment of silence. "About the other part of your…"

"You do realize you look rather like Howard Stark, don't you Tony?"

"…well, nobody else seemed to notice."

"Tony, I think I can be counted as some sort of expert in hiding oneself, wouldn't you agree?" Bruce said wryly. "But I also have vague memories of a little boy called Tony at the last Stark ball and wizardry conference that I attended."

"You… you _remembered me?_"

"Well, it seems like you also remembered me, didn't you?" Bruce replied with good humor. "I just thought you looked like you rather be somewhere else instead of being paraded in front of all the guests. I'm afraid I shared the sentiment."

"That's what I thought when I saw you!" Unbidden, a genuine smile formed on Tony's face, even though memories of various galas and balls were not amongst the ones he liked from his childhood. "You know, I don't like to believe in fate and destiny, but I'm glad we met."

At that, Bruce smiled became just a little wider than what Tony had seen before and he couldn't help but feel happy about being able to do that. Tony knew that it had been a long time since the wizard genuinely had things to be happy about.

"I'm glad we met too," the other man replied sincerely. "I also won't tell anyone about who you are, if you don't want me to."

"Natasha knows because she works for me. But for now… I don't want to let the rest of them know."

Bruce nodded and didn't press any further.

* * *

After having essentially two heart-to-heart talks with two different people in such a short time, Tony found himself alternately hanging out with Bruce or being around Steve a lot more often than he imagined he would. His improved relationship, _friendship_ with Steve had translated into even more effectiveness during combat and just… Well, Tony felt a lot freer now than he had before. As if a weight had been taken off his shoulders because he had managed to patch things up with Steve and had a kindred spirit in Bruce.

He would admit that having Steve acknowledge him and consider a friend had gone a long way to soothing his insecurities because of Howard, but it wasn't just that. With their friendship, they began to seek each other's company during down time and Tony found out that Steve was an artist, or as the man himself liked to say, enjoyed sketching. There hadn't been much time for Steve to draw on this journey, but the paladin had obliged Tony's request (demand) to see some of his works on his sketchpad.

Tony was no connoisseur of fine art – that was more of Pepper's area – but he could tell that Steve could certainly draw. He later managed to wheedle Steve into drawing something for him after he saw a sketch that was clearly a part of his mansion. He'd told Steve that he wanted to put it up in his room and prove to Pepper that he _did _have some artistic taste no matter what she said.

As for the times that he didn't spend with Steve, he tended to be around Bruce, prodding the wizard's mind as they shared and discussed theories. He was now really glad that Bruce knew the truth about him. Though he had already offered Bruce to stay with him once this was all over, Tony knew he would be insisting ten times as hard until his new friend caved and gave in. His mansion had more than enough space, and he could convert a room into a private study for Bruce. He knew that the wizard missed the opportunity to do research, and Tony would gladly provide all he could for Bruce to catch up on the work he so loved.

He also found a confidant in Bruce and it was a mutual thing. He found himself explaining to Bruce why he ran away from home and hid his identity. Bruce did not judge him, and had instead reciprocated – even though Tony had insisted that it wasn't an exchange – by telling him about how he got bitten (Bruce was saving a boy who'd wandered into the forests at night) and how drastically his life had changed after that.

Now, it was just over a week since they'd destroyed one of HYDRA's smaller bases and found Bruce. Tony had kept Bruce's secret, and had managed to talk Bruce out of confessing it to the rest of the team. He knew that it still didn't sit right with Bruce, keeping the fact that he was a Were from the rest of them. But Tony had also seen how much happier Bruce was now, with everyone treating him like a normal human being and not like a dangerous animal in human shape.

Perhaps it was a very Tony Stark way of dealing with things but it had worked for Tony. And a part of Tony also knew it was because he didn't want to risk losing the new but already flourishing friendship he had with Bruce who could and _would_ have lengthy discussions with Tony about pretty much anything under the sun. So he was a selfish asshole but that wasn't anything new or remotely surprising about Tony Stark.

But as things went, Tony never quite got what he wanted in the end.

It had mostly been a peaceful (relatively speaking) journey through some farmlands before they gave way to the start of more forested wilderness. Then they'd gotten waylaid by a group of bandits. The group had sort of been forewarned from the innkeeper in the village they'd stopped in, though it had been a little surprising that the thugs had mostly gotten a drop on them. Natasha and Clint had felt that something was off, but it hadn't really been until the first, unsubtle crunch of boots in the undergrowth that had everyone on complete alert. Then it had devolved into a frenzy of action as a large number of men swarmed out to surround them and combat began in earnest.

The men, while large in numbers, weren't particularly difficult to knock out or incapacitate. Tony supposed, as he fired off blasts of energy from both hands, that the reason why this group of bandits had ever been successful enough to warrant a warning was due to their sheer numbers. But if one could get past that, then they'd be fine.

Then suddenly, in the midst of all the fighting, he heard a startled cry of pain from Bruce. Tony turned around to see Bruce clutching his right arm protectively. Then like a pack of hungry wolves that had scented first blood, a number of the bandits turned their attention towards the injured wizard.

"Bruce!" Tony cried out, blasting away three men rushing towards him as he tried to head over to Bruce's side.

In a matter of moments, Bruce was out of sight as more men surrounded him while others got into Tony's way. Just as abruptly, there were panicked, frantic yells from the bandits but those were drowned out when a loud growl echoed through the forest. For a second, Tony thought that a wild beast had stumbled across them, but then the sound of yelling got louder and some of them were actual screams of terror and others of pain that were abruptly cut short. Without even having to really see Bruce, Tony knew with a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach that Bruce had transformed.

Tony did not even need to try and fight off the thugs blocking his way to Bruce now. They had all scattered, pushing each other out of the way, almost trampling over each other in their bid to flee into the forest. The only ones not running frantically away were either dead, dying or just a little too far from Bruce and Tony to see what was going on.

"Holy shit!" Clint exclaimed, having spotted the carnage from wherever his current vantage point was.

Tony felt very much like adding to Clint's oath when he finally saw the transformed Bruce. He'd known Bruce was a lycanthrope , but he didn't know what Bruce's animal form was. He hadn't thought to ask as it was clearly a very touchy topic for Bruce (Tony could be tactful, hard as it was to believe) and Bruce hadn't offered the information when explaining how he got turned.

Bruce was a _weretiger._

The sleek form of the large tiger stood in the middle of the bloody carnage Bruce had left behind after his transformation, teeth bared to show long canines that were covered in blood. Tony had half a second to admire the majestic beauty that was Bruce's tiger form before Bruce _moved._

With one graceful, powerful leap, Bruce had covered the quite considerable distance between himself and two of the stragglers of the bandit group. Powerful paws raked down each man's back, leaving deep, bloody gashes behind. The cries of fear and agony from the men as they died alerted the rest of the group to Bruce's new form.

In their fear, some of the bandits with crossbows began pelting Bruce with bolts. Bruce shook them off like they were just minor annoyances and the few that managed to puncture the tiger's hide trickled the smallest amount of blood before enhanced healing factors sealed the wounds closed. In short, the bandits' efforts were doing more to irritate the already-angry weretiger instead of debilitating him.

"Bruce Banner's a _weretiger?" _Peggy exclaimed in shock, but Tony could hear the wariness and even some fear in the cleric's tone.

Hearing Peggy's words spurred the remaining bandits into action. Most of them abandoned their original motive of robbing them and started to run. It was unfortunate for them that Bruce had _not _appreciated being pelted with crossbow bolts despite the less than superficial wounds they had caused him. In yet another burst of speed, Bruce had downed a couple more bandits. The weretiger was about to head after the rest of the escaping thugs when Steve stepped right into Bruce's path, his shield raised defensively in front of him.

"Stand down, Banner. They're already running away, surrendering. There's no need to chase them down," Steve ordered in his sternest tone of voice.

"Steve!" Peggy called out in worry, because everyone knew it was reckless to get in the way of an angry, running-on-instinct lycanthrope.

From where he was standing, Tony could not see Bruce's face, but he wasn't sure that Steve words would get to Bruce. And they could end up with the very unpleasant situation of an injured Steve. Sure, Steve was much more heavily armored than any of the bandits, but Tony wasn't going to underestimate Bruce's strength in his tiger form. Bruce might be able to rip off the plates of armor even if he wouldn't be able to claw through it.

With that in mind and hoping that his next decision would turn out to be right, Tony took off from the ground, speeding towards Bruce and Steve and then landed so that he was right in between Bruce and Steve.

"Tony, what are you doing?" Steve whispered with a mildly panicked tone at Tony, but Tony ignored the paladin.

"Bruce, hey, it's all good now," he said to the tiger instead.

This close to Bruce, he could see that Bruce was larger than the average tiger. He watched as Bruce's eyes – now colored gold instead of dark brown – focused on him instead of Steve. He wasn't seeing any sort of recognition in Bruce's eyes, and the muscles of the tiger were still coiled with tension and looking like he would spring into attack at any moment.

"Bruce? C'mon buddy, everything's fine now."

Bruce gave a little rumbling growl, moving minutely closer to Tony as the weretiger's head ducked down a little. Steve shifted behind Tony at that movement and Tony immediately held his arm out to block the paladin from rushing forwards. At the same time, he became aware that Clint and Peggy both had their arrows nocked and trained on Bruce and that Natasha had no less than four daggers in her hands and was moving silently towards Bruce as well.

"All of you drop your weapons!" he demanded instantly. "This is Bruce here. We're not going to _attack _him!"

"Tony, this was an uncontrolled transformation. He's acting entirely on instinct," Steve said urgently. "Right now, that instinct is set to fight and kill."

"No, he isn't," he rebutted matter-of-factly. "Bruce wasn't stepping forward to harm me. If he were, I'd be dead long before any of you could do a thing anyway."

"Tony, don't be stupid," Natasha hissed at him. "I'm not telling Pepper you got yourself killed!"

"I'm not going to get killed, Natasha. You and Pepper can all rest easy," Tony insisted with a roll of his eyes.

Then slowly, he reached out a hand, keeping his palm open where Bruce could see it clearly. Bruce's earlier movement had put Tony close enough to him that he could feel the copious amounts of heat that the weretiger form of the wizard was giving off. There wasn't all that much distance between his hand and Bruce's fur. Carefully, Tony let his palm brush against Bruce's fur gently, just behind the feline ears. Then Bruce turned his head into Tony's hand, rubbing his ear into it. Tony smiled, and began gently stroking the soft, striped fur.

"See guys? He knows us, well, he knows _me_ at the very least. Drop the weapons."

"You don't seem very surprised by the fact that Banner's a lycanthrope," Natasha commented flatly. "You knew before the rest of us, didn't you?"

Leave it to Natasha, superspy extraordinaire to figure that one out so quickly. Tony wasn't about to deny it however. It was blatantly obvious now that he knew about Bruce's condition.

"Yes, I knew Bruce was a lycanthrope. I just didn't know what his animal form was."

"That day when we first found him and you suddenly just destroyed that metallic case," Steve suddenly spoke up from behind him, realization evident in his speech. "It was…"

"Silver. Yes, it was made of silver. I identified it by touch alone and then deduced why it'd hurt Bruce when he had handled it."

"And you didn't think that it was important for us to know?" Steve demanded and Tony could hear the beginnings of disapproval, maybe even anger coloring Steve's tone.

"No," Tony shot back, turning to glare at Steve even as he made sure he still had a hand in Bruce's fur. "Because I know what it's like to be hated and feared because of something you couldn't control, because of something you didn't even ask for. Even by the people who're supposed to be your _family_ and are _supposed to love you_ regardless of anything."

It was as if some sort of key had been turned, unlocking the gates behind which Tony kept his resentment against his lot in life and letting it all spill forth. Vaguely, he felt horrified at what he was saying, knowing it was a mix of defending Bruce and throwing _a lot _of his issues into the light. He'd been accused of having no brain-to-mouth filter, but it wasn't true. Not for the important matters. But right now, it was as if his brain had disconnected from his mouth; he couldn't seem to stop himself.

"It fucking _hurts._ Worse than someone taking a rusty knife to your heart, twisting it slowly into your body and then pouring salt straight into the bloody hole. I got used to it because that's what I had to do, but I know Bruce _hasn't_. Bruce wasn't born a lycanthrope; the old farts in charge of the wizardry schools wouldn't have let Bruce step through the gateway no matter how much raw natural talent he had if that had been the case. And before you say that he could've hidden it, there are _anti-lycanthropy_ _tests_ to go through before being accepted and it's not that easy to hide monthly transformations during the full moon in a densely populated school!"

He couldn't stop his voice from rising in volume as he continued, "Bruce disappeared from the world four years ago because he got turned into a lycanthrope. He chose to hide because he didn't want to accidentally hurt anybody when he transformed, but the few odd instances when he was found out… If I'd been in his place, I'd have taken out the entire village in a fit of unthinking rage. Just because fucking Fate conspired to screw you over doesn't make you _evil _and _unstable. _If anything, it's the people around you who eventually drive you into insanity.

"Bruce is a _good person._ To hell with the notion that he's supposedly dangerous because he's got a furry little problem now! He stopped, didn't he? When you stepped in his way, Captain, he could've torn apart your armor and killed you if he'd been acting entirely on instinct. Maybe when he first transformed in pain and in anger he was acting on instinct, but by that time, Bruce clearly _wasn't._ We've never talked about it, but there's nobody and there will _never be _anybody who can hate us for the things we couldn't control, more than we can ourselves!"

His chest was heaving by the time he'd finished his long and loud rant at the unfairness of the world and their situations. Tony hadn't even realized that he had, at some point during his rant, started gesticulating with both hands until he felt a tentative touch of another person's hand to his shoulder from behind him and realized that Bruce had turned back into his human form.

"Oh hey, Bruce. You're back," he said with a wan but fond smile.

The wizard returned his smile, looking tired as if the transformation had taken a lot out of him. It probably did.

"Tony, thank you," Bruce said. "But… but what you did, getting between me in that state… It's just not safe. I, I don't know how much the beast knows that you're… well you."

"I'd say after today, both sides of you would recognize me. I'm not afraid of you."

"You really do need to have better self-preservation instincts, Tony," Bruce admonished but did not lecture further. Instead, he turned to face Steve. "I'm sorry that I did not let you know about my… condition. It was refreshing not being shunned by other humans who weren't only interested in using me for their own purposes."

"Hold it, Bruce," Tony interrupted because Bruce was very likely, deliberately hiding a key point from the rest. He knew what he did and he didn't require deflection of blame. "You forgot to mention the fact that _I_ talked you out of telling them. That'll make it my fault, but I'm not really sorry because you're my friend and I'm selfish for wanting you around."

"I think that it's quite clear that Bruce did not mean us any harm by concealing his lycanthropy," Peggy said as she came closer with her weapons already lowered.

It was a gesture that Tony fully approved of. As it stood, only Peggy had lowered her weapons, although Clint was beginning to look less on edge as he came closer. Two of Natasha's knives had disappeared, which was slightly encouraging, but she was still armed and Tony wasn't fooled into thinking that she couldn't whip the rest out again in the blink of an eye. Steve still had his shield held out in front of him but he did not have a serious, battle concentration look on his face.

"Bruce, we might not completely understand what you've been through since being bitten but I think all of us can say we understand not wanting to be lonely," Peggy continued to say.

Steve lowered his shield from its original defensive position and a softer, sympathetic expression formed on his face. "It may not be the same but I understand being discriminated. I want you to know that you don't have to feel like you need to hide just for us to accept you."

"Nevertheless," Bruce insisted, "I should have found an opportunity to tell all of you before something like this happened. I have control, usually. But today was close. I'm sorry."

"Well, I don't think that's something anyone would normally tell a group of people that they've only known for a week," Clint pointed out reasonably. "But it's good that it's out now."

Natasha joined the circle that everyone else had unconsciously formed to include Bruce. Her hands were conspicuously devoid of weapons. "I understand secrets and not wanting to hurt or kill others," was all she said directly to Bruce.

"Good! Great! Do we need a group hug?" Tony declared, the last part done mostly jokingly, but he would do it if it was called for.

"That's all right, Tony," Bruce said with a smile that was looking a bit tired. "Thank you, all of you."

"You sure, Brucey? Because I can call for a group hug, you know. It's no trouble at all, right?"

"I'm sure, Tony. I'm just really tired now. Could we head onwards to our next stop?"

"Sure, but you might want to put on some clothes first."

* * *

After Bruce had changed into untorn clothing, they managed to reach the next village in good time. It was lucky, especially since Bruce was really tired after his uncontrolled transformation. He hadn't transformed due to provocation in a long time and had explained that it was a lot more taxing than it normally was during full moons or a voluntary change. When they had secured rooms, Bruce all but stumbled into one of them, collapsed on to a bed and was asleep instantly. Tony made a move to follow after the wizard into the room, but Steve stopped him.

"Tony. We need to talk."

Tony glanced at him, wariness in his eyes. "Suuure. Just let me-"

"I don't think you'd want our talk to disturb Bruce."

The warlock's deep brown eyes narrowed at him. "Are you implying what I think you are?"

"We're going to talk, Tony. I think it will take some time and raised voices might be involved. I would prefer it if we shared a room instead."

Tony seemed to twitch a little, probably at the calm and reasonable way Steve was speaking. "What, so neither of us can storm out if it all gets too much? Sure that's a good idea, Captain?"

Steve just stubbornly looked at Tony. He had spent the time it had taken to reach the village stop thinking over what he wanted to do and say to Tony and he wasn't going to let the warlock out of it. It was true that Tony had a point that if they didn't manage to resolve anything during their talk, it would be awkward sharing the room even if it were only for one night. Nevertheless, he still had the urge to keep Tony near him. It wasn't as strong as that day when Tony fell from the air and almost died, but it was still present.

Finally, Tony sighed but stalked into a different room. "Suit yourself, Captain."

Steve followed after Tony wordlessly, closing and locking the door behind him. He followed Tony's lead for now, setting down his belongings and getting slightly more comfortable by removing pieces of his armor. Then he settled himself on the bed he claimed, facing the warlock, waiting for him to finish fiddling with his things.

"Alright, quit staring at me. It's uncomfortable," Tony said, as he turned around and sat on the other bed. "Okay, so what did you want to talk about? I'm gonna guess it's about Bruce's little incident today, right? You're still upset that I didn't tell anyone about it?"

"Yes, I am upset, but not because you didn't tell anyone about Bruce's situation. I was, and still am, upset because it was a very legitimate possibility that Bruce wouldn't recognize us after an uncontrolled transformation," he tried to keep his voice calm and reasonable, but as he thought back to the moment when Tony put himself between Bruce's huge tiger form and Steve… He just couldn't quite keep it all together. "You can't deny that, even _Bruce _admitted it. And you, you just _stepped in between us. _It was reckless, _needlessly _reckless!"

"Speak for yourself, Captain. Who was the one who stepped into Bruce's way _first_ to prevent him from giving chase after the bandits?"

"I'm better equipped to deal with Bruce at close range if he failed to recognize us than you are, Tony. I…" Steve sighed. He hadn't wanted to go back to shouting at Tony, but that idiotic move the warlock had pulled still left him shaky and his emotions were a little out of whack. "It's stupid, okay? I just wished I'd known earlier or found out in a different way that did not involve tense combat conditions. I wouldn't have judged Bruce. It's clear that he isn't prone to aggression and violence. I… I wish we could just trust each other more."

"Yes, well, it just isn't that easy to trust others when you know the general sentiment and have been burnt a few times," Tony muttered, though he didn't look as angry as he did a short while ago.

Steve thought back to Tony's rant, recalling the way Tony had spoken as if it was a personal experience. It might have been. Steve knew there were several ways that warlocks came about and he couldn't see Tony entering a forbidden contract with a demon or a devil. And if Tony's family hadn't been able to accept his awakening as a warlock, then it was most likely that Tony had been picked by the fickle hand of Fate to bear those powers.

"I'm sorry for what you had to go through, Tony."

"W-What are you talking about, Captain?"

Tony was starting to look uncomfortable but Steve ploughed straight on, knowing that if he let Tony, the other man would run from this conversation faster than lightning. "When you were defending Bruce, the way you said certain things… You've experienced them firsthand, haven't you?"

A look of consternation crossed Tony's face, as if he'd just realized how telling he'd been during his rant earlier. "I… Yes, yes I have."

"Do… Do you want to talk about it? I can't promise that I know exactly how it feels, but I… I used to be picked on and beaten up a lot."

"What? Why would anyone do that to _you_?" Tony exclaimed, surprised and a little outraged.

Steve tried to ignore the warm feeling in his chest because of that and explained, "I was sickly and small as a child, and that didn't change until quite recently. But even then, I couldn't stand bullies and would stand up to them even though I knew I wouldn't be able to really defend myself if they started to get physical. Bucky had to pull me out of a lot of fights."

"Had that righteous paladin thing going from the start, didn't you, Steve?"

"I just don't like bullies," he replied with a slight blush. Really, he _wasn't_ all that special.

"Sometimes, I wonder how you're even real," Tony muttered. "Compared to you, I'm a screw up of epic proportions. My family probably saw it coming."

"That's not true! You're not a screw up!" Steve protested immediately, shocked that Tony would think that of himself.

"Tell that to my family. For the longest time, all I wanted was to have my father be proud of me. But how could that happen if I'd already failed at having any sort of magical competence? So I tried to make up for that lack in other ways, in other areas. But it never worked.

"The final straw was when my warlock powers awoke when I was fifteen. I became a pariah. My father wouldn't even look at me. In fact, after he got over his shock, he locked himself up in his workroom and didn't leave for days. I decided to run away from home about two years later because I couldn't take it anymore… and my mother had passed away. Died in a freak accident. She was one of the only people left who still loved me and treated me normally, so when she died, I… Well, it's been seven years since then and I haven't heard a single word from the rest of them. I guess they must be glad that I'm gone. Must be the best decision I've made in my life."

Tony finished speaking with a wry, self-depreciating smirk. The incongruous sight and Tony's story made Steve's heart ache. No wonder the man had trust issues. Steve knew he'd been lucky, despite having spent most of his life being small and sickly and coming from one of the poorer areas of the city, because he'd had his mother's undying love and support as well as Bucky who'd stuck by him through thick and thin. It didn't sound like Tony had any of that.

In two strides, Steve covered the distance between them and enveloped Tony in a hug. He felt the warlock stiffen, almost wanting to draw back. Tony seemed unused to the concept of hugging and that was a heartbreaking notion.

"I'm sorry," he said softly. "You shouldn't have had to go through all of that. Nobody should have to."

Tony was still holding himself awkwardly in Steve's embrace, making no move to do anything as the other man replied haltingly, "That's… Life just… doesn't always work out."

"I know. I'm just glad you're okay and that I got to meet you."

"Tch. Don't go all sentimental on me, Steve."

Behind Tony's flippant words, Steve could hear the disbelief. A little impulsively, he held Tony a bit closer. "I'm not lying, Tony. I'm really glad to have met you," he repeated, willing Tony to believe him. Then to try and diffuse the tension, Steve added, "Even if you were a pain in the ass the first time we met."

That made Tony snort and some of the stiffness in his body melted away. "I'm still a pain in the ass. Also, I think I just made you swear. Clearly, I'm a bad influence."

"Then maybe we'll balance each other out," he answered with a smile as he pulled away from Tony.

"Ha! Maybe," Tony said. Then a solemn look entered as his face as the warlock continued, "Steve… Thank you… for listening to me and all that. I don't usually, you know…"

"I'm honored you shared your history with me. Just don't feel like you're obliged to tell me everything. It's your choice Tony, okay?"

"Okay."

"Also, please _don't _throw yourself into dangerous situations any more than you have to. Bruce was right in that you really need to develop some self-preservation instincts."

"Fine, you mother hen! You and Bruce both!" Tony grumbled, but he wasn't truly annoyed if the small smile he had was anything to go by.

In the end, Tony did not share anything more personal with him that night. Nonetheless, Steve felt that their friendship had become even stronger than before, and that was more than all right with him.


	5. Chapter 5

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 5_

It was the last town where they could get decent supplies to last them the remainder of the trek to their final destination. They were only supposed to be there for a night, two at most, to refresh themselves and make the final preparations for their end goal. It was meant to be trouble-free and it was, until it wasn't.

"I knew it! Tony Stark! It's been so long since we last met!" a feminine voice suddenly cried out.

The next thing Tony knew, he had an armful of Janet van Dyne. Janet was the daughter of another aristocratic clan in Mainheim who had dealings with the Starks, and being only a year younger than Tony, they'd played together whenever the van Dynes visited. Normally, Tony wouldn't have minded meeting Janet again (she was one of the few people from his past that he actually liked), but right now, his stomach felt like lead.

He had forgotten that though this particular town wasn't all that large and almost too far up north to be hospitable to people not born in its climes, a rather prominent noble family – that boasted a decent number of wizards – dwelled here. Of course, with his luck, his party had to have arrived in town just when there was some sort of event being held. It was the only reason he could think of for why Janet was here and not back in Mainheim.

Mentally, he sighed, lamenting the fact that he could never seem to catch a break. It was barely a week ago when the team found out about Bruce's lycanthropy. It sometimes seemed like every time he had something remotely good happen to him, something unpleasant was bound to catch up to him in the near future. Meeting Jan herself was not unpleasant but he would have much preferred it be not in front of the rest of his party because this meeting would surely dredge up things that he hadn't wanted the others to know. Not yet, at least.

Maybe.

"Hey, Jan. It's been awhile."

Letting go of him, Jan stepped back to give him a thorough onceover before replying. "It's been _years, _Tony! Seven years! Nobody knew where you disappeared to and the favorite gossip was that you'd _died. _I never did believe that though. Tony Stark's not that easy to kill!"

"Huh, I guess I'm not. So… What are you doing so far away from home?"

Tony did his best to divert Jan away from the matter of his family by asking questions that was probably expected of him, though he feared it was already too late. Janet had mentioned his family name twice now and the rest of his traveling party had all been close by when she'd first appeared.

"Oh, there's a ball in town tomorrow evening and my family was invited. Hmm… I think yours was too, though nobody knows for sure if your father's coming. He hasn't been in the habit of showing up at balls and galas since a few years back."

And there went his attempt to change the topic. He wished he could blame Janet but he couldn't. It wasn't her fault she unwittingly revealed his identity; she didn't even _know _that he was more well-known as Lord Antonius (the Death-Dealer) instead of Lord Anthony Stark these days. Then there was the fact that he may or may not have a sudden reunion with dear old dad in the near future to (not) look forward to.

Could his day get any worse?

Then Janet caught sight of his traveling party. "Oh hello! Are you all Tony's friends? I'm Janet van Dyne! Nice to meet you!"

As the others murmured introductions and pleasantries, Tony's mind whirred, trying to find a way to make Janet leave without it being suspicious. Well, without it being suspicious to Janet anyway. It was too late for the rest of them.

"Jan, it was great seeing you again," he said with a smile. "We've been traveling for quite a bit though, do you mind if we retire to rest? I'll catch up with you later?"

Tony hadn't wanted to add the last part but knowing Janet, she would insist on it anyway. Hopefully, he could find a way out of meeting her again afterwards. He didn't think he'd have the energy to deal with it. Not after the little fiasco that was going to happen soon. Or maybe it would be good to meet with Jan, so he could escape whatever backlash that was going to occur just for a little while.

"Oh, alright then! I still have some shopping to do anyway. My family has a cottage here, look for me there! See you later, Tony!" Then with a wave to everyone, Janet flitted away into the crowd.

"That, was Janet van Dyne. As in _heiress _to the van Dynes of Mainheim," Clint said, breaking the awkward lull caused by Janet's departure.

Tony finally turned to look at his friends, most of them wearing expressions that said they were still trying to figure out what had just happened.

"Yes," he answered.

"And she's your childhood friend."

"…yes." There was no point in denying it anymore.

Clint opened his mouth to speak again but Tony quickly cut in, "Look, I'll explain everything. But not out here on the streets, okay?"

"That's fine. Let's return to the inn now."

Tony fought not to flinch at Steve's tone. He hadn't heard the paladin sound like this in a while. Steve was speaking in distantly polite tones, conveying civility when beneath it, the blond was hiding some other emotion. Usually an explosive one.

"Sure, let's go," Tony echoed.

The ensuing walk to the inn was the most painful one he'd experienced. It was awkwardly quiet, and Tony felt like he was walking to his execution. When they reached their destination, Tony headed for the room he was sharing with Bruce, knowing the others would follow. He was just minutely relieved he'd chosen to room with Bruce instead of Steve this time.

When everyone had settled into the room, sitting or leaning against various pieces of furniture, the door securely shut and the place soundproofed by Bruce, Tony took a quick moment to catalogue everyone's expressions as he sat on a chair that felt more uncomfortable than it probably actually was. Bruce was sympathetic, Natasha's impassive as usual but the fact she was on his other side – the side not occupied by Bruce – said everything. Clint was looking expectant, Peggy was also mostly impassive and Steve… Steve's face was so carefully blank. Like he was trying his best to remain neutral.

"So… Let me introduce myself again," he said. "I am Anthony Edward Stark, sole heir to the Starks of Mainheim. The van Dynes and the Starks have always had dealings, so that's how I met Janet."

"Why did you keep your identity as secret? The Starks never mentioned their heir was a warlock either," Peggy commented neutrally.

A sardonic smirk formed on Tony's face; he couldn't help it. "You all know the Starks are a clan of wizard geniuses, with the odd sorcerer in the bloodline. Either way, Starks are supposed to be masters in the arcane arts. Then there's _me_, born without the _slightest bit_ of magical aptitude, which was embarrassing enough as it was without having warlock powers manifesting when I turned fifteen. Do you _really _think they'd let all of that become public knowledge?"

"It still doesn't explain why you chose to hide your identity."

"Because I want nothing to do with the Starks. I was all but disowned when my powers awakened; my own father couldn't even bear to _look_ at me after that. Not that he ever did a fantastic job of looking after me, I mean, failure of a son since birth you're looking at here.

"I couldn't stand it anymore after almost two years. So I thought, since warlocks had such a bad name and I was _Bad_ just because of _that_, then I should actually do something to warrant my apparent infamy and evilness. Then my mother passed away," his voice caught just a little when he mentioned his mother. After all this time, there was still a dull ache when he thought of her. "And there went one of the people who still loved me, so I just couldn't be bothered to care anymore. I ran away from home, changed my name, cut all ties with the Starks and then made a name of myself in war and battles.

"I haven't thought about myself as Howard Stark's son in so long, it's second nature to "keep it a secret" as you say. The Starks haven't even bothered to look for me since I disappeared seven years ago and I plan to keep it that way. They'd look for me if my identity got leaked, if only to keep up appearances."

"Wait a minute, you're only twenty-four now?" Clint suddenly said, eyes wide with surprise. "You're _younger _than all of us?"

Despite himself, Tony found some measure of delight in hearing the "oh-my-god-I'm-older-than-him" that went unsaid just by the tone of Clint's voice. "The goatee makes me look older, which was sort of the point. People tend to believe you have more experience because of your age and it was also another way to make it seem like I have no connection to the Stark heir."

"Even when it makes you look like a younger version of Howard Stark?"

It was the first time Steve had spoken since Tony started his sordid little tale. Steve didn't sound at all happy and though a part of him shriveled and died inside, Tony _had_ sort of expected it.

"See Captain, the human mind works in strange ways. No one expects a warlock to come from the great, noble house of Stark, so nobody's going to question why I resemble the current head of house. Most of you hail from Mainheim. Did it ever cross your minds that I could possibly be a Stark all this time?"

The resulting silence was answer enough for Tony.

"Well," he still felt obliged to put it out clearly and in the open, "There's your answer to that question. Are there anymore?"

"Does anybody else know about your true identity?" Peggy asked.

"Rhodey, Pepper, Natasha and Bruce. The first three all agreed with me on keeping my identity a secret."

"But for different reasons," Natasha interjected smoothly. "Tony's already rather notorious as the warlock Antonius. If it were known that he was actually Anthony Stark, the number of people after him for his life or wealth would exponentially increase."

"Why were we invited to your mansion that day?" Steve asked quietly.

It was Natasha who answered yet again in a matter-of-fact tone. "Threat watch. Rhodes and I are in charge of the town and Tony's safety and security. A paladin and a cleric travelling through together is extremely rare and hence suspicious. We both agreed that we needed to determine if you had any agenda."

"Like if we were sent to capture Tony," Peggy deduced.

"Or kill him," Natasha agreed with a curt nod. "Normally we don't invite potential threats into the mansion; we send someone out to interact with them, investigate and determine if they're really dangerous. I tend to be the one who does that job, which posed a problem because there was a chance that Clint would recognize me and blow my cover.

"So Pepper suggested to invite you to the mansion, regardless of whether my cover was blown or not. She thought it would be a good idea to start clearing up some of the erroneous rumors about Tony. It could even make it a little less likely for paladins and clerics from other churches to turn up with intentions to harm Tony. Besides, if you were threats, we could neutralize you from inside the mansion. Either way, Tony knew nothing of the plan until the very last minute."

There was a long silence as Natasha's revelation was absorbed and digested. Tony had long suspected that he had masochistic tendencies and that was clearly evident in the way he was watching Steve while trying to make it seem like he wasn't. Steve's previously blank expression had morphed into furrowed eyebrows and a slight frown as Natasha's explanations had continued. He wondered what Steve thought of him now.

Tony had lied about so much to Steve. Everything that was being revealed to the paladin at this point was sure to strain, if not break, the still tender bonds of their friendship… and the mere thought of that made a sharp pain lance through his heart. Somewhere along the way, he'd gone from hating Steve to liking him enough that Tony actually _treasured _this new friendship. Now, he dreaded whether there was anything salvageable left.

"We really are a bunch of people with trust issues, huh?" Clint finally said. "I mean, most of it is reasonable and understandable. But it's kind of a wonder that we make such a good team. How many more secrets are going to come out?"

Clint's question was probably rhetorical but to Tony's surprise, Natasha spoke up. "I used to be a spy and assassin. It is not something I like to talk about but I have a lot of red in my ledger."

"Well, uh… 'Tasha, I…"

The redhead shrugged, still looking like the epitome of calm. "I thought that we should get it all out of the way."

Tony honestly doubted that Natasha was really all that cool about telling the rest of the group even the slightest bit of her past, but he appreciated her indirect show of support. He had never specifically asked her about what kind of life she'd led prior to stumbling across her bleeding out in an alley and deciding to take her in to patch her up. It had somehow led to Natasha deciding to stay. The way he had found her and subsequently witnessing her skills had already given him good enough conclusions to draw about Natasha's life.

"We all have our secrets, some more than others. We're entering the last leg of this journey, so I hope that this won't affect our end goal," Natasha added.

"It won't," Steve finally said, but he still wouldn't look at Tony.

Tony didn't know he _could_ even feel this crushed by that little non-reaction.

* * *

"Are you okay?" Bruce asked tentatively, sometime after everyone else had vacated the room.

Tony considered the question and then considered lying. But he doubted Bruce would believe him, even if he had the energy to muster a convincing reply.

"They hate me, don't they?" he said instead.

"I doubt that they'd hate you for what you did…"

"But? I sense a "but" coming up."

"They will take time to come to terms with it. Steve will."

Bruce going for the jugular figuratively wasn't something that Tony liked. The wizard was a great observer, and the fact that he was normally unassuming and unobtrusive made it such that people tended to let their guard down around him. That made Bruce an even more proficient observer. Tony was a little annoyed, but not surprised, that Bruce knew what was the crux of Tony's worries. Still, there was no harm in playing dumb.

"Who said anything about the Captain?"

Bruce sighed. "Nobody had to say anything. I have eyes, Tony. Remember, I was the one who saw Steve's reaction to you falling from the sky the first time we met. You and Steve have been dancing around each other since I joined your group, possibly even earlier. You care the most about Steve's opinion of you at this point."

"We hated each other in the beginning, you know. But it was mostly my fault. My father was his mentor and I could tell that there was familiarity between them. I got upset and annoyed because I didn't know this great wizard he and everyone else in the world held in esteem and… Steve was a reminder that I was a failure in Howard Stark's eyes, such that he never even bothered with me. So I lashed out at Steve and he didn't really react until I started insulting my dad. Steve actually punched me."

"And you just took it?"

"Well, I didn't see it coming. Literally and figuratively. I knew I deserved it, but I couldn't help but feel vindictive. Steve wasn't perfect after all; he threw the first punch. But after traveling with them and getting into skirmishes, we realized that we clicked in combat situations. Then slowly, it started to improve from there and I could finally admit to myself that Steve really was a good guy." Tony sighed, "I just don't get why _he _decided to befriend me. I mean, we worked well enough on the field, it wasn't as if we really had to get along in other situations."

"I'm sure Steve had the same realization that you had. That you're not the person he thought you were.

"I'm not a good man, Bruce. Not like Steve."

"You _are _a good person, Tony. You have Natasha's loyalty and I believe that's an extremely rare thing. You built a town for people who have nowhere to go, who were discriminated and outcasts but hadn't done anything morally reprehensible. And that's without even going into how you kept my secret and stood up for me when it came out."

"Bruce…"

"Tony. Just listen to me. You gained my trust instantly after you destroyed that silver case. Do you know how long it's been that I've really trusted someone? You're my closest friend right now."

Tony couldn't help it. He blushed. Bruce had never been particularly chatty about personal feelings throughout the time they'd gotten to know each other and to hear all that the other man had said… It made Tony want to believe him.

"Uh well… thanks, Bruce."

"Don't worry about it too much, okay? You probably should get some rest, you look exhausted."

"Not now," he said, as he stood up from where he was slumped on a chair. "I probably should find Jan and catch up a bit or she'd be liable to come search for me. It's been a long while since I've seen her and… and it could be good I guess."

He had been running away from his past for so long but maybe it was time to stop. He wasn't going to go running back to his clan anytime soon, if ever. But he could start by reconnecting with some old friends and his memories of Jan were all good. At the very least, it would stop him from running himself ragged with worry about how the rest of his new friends (_Steve_) were handling the truth for the moment.

* * *

Tony was Anthony Stark. He was a Stark, and more specifically, Howard Stark's son. His mentor's son.

Before he'd known Tony's true identity, Tony had told Steve about how his family had treated him. How his _father_ had treated him.

He had been mostly silent when Tony was relaying the story of his past and how he came to be the man he was today. He was silent because he had been shocked and then Steve just could not find any words to say because he was feeling horrified that such a thing had happened to Tony, remembered feeling that it wasn't what family should do. He had once wondered what kind of a man would do that to a young boy, to neglect him so much that Tony still bore the scars, hidden but nonetheless still there. To find out that the mentor he respected had been the cause of a good number of Tony's issues… It was akin to having his world turned upside down.

The Howard Stark that Steve knew wasn't a man prone to overt displays of emotion but nonetheless, he had still shown approval and concern when it'd been needed. He'd seen Howard when he was in the manic phase of discovery, invention and creation (and now he saw how that was similar to when Tony nattered on excitedly with Bruce about magic and science and just, _how had he not seen it?_), but Howard had somehow managed to take out some time to talk to Steve. The man that Tony described as his father didn't match with Steve's knowledge of his mentor. Then again, he hadn't even known that Howard had a son. His mentor didn't speak much of his personal life and Steve had never found the need to ask.

As for the fact that Tony had been hiding his identity for so long, even after Steve had hoped that they could all begin trusting each other… He didn't know what to make of that. Or rather, he had different emotions roiling around in him – anger, sadness, betrayal, confusion – that it was hard to discern what was causing which emotion. If a single cause could even be prescribed to each emotion.

Now though, Steve finally had his answer as to why Tony hated Howard so much. In fact, Tony's sudden change in demeanor that night in the workshop was starting to make some sense.

Tony had of course been able to identify his shield as Howard Stark's personal work. Then there was the complete and utter fascination that Tony had for the shield, not to mention the odd moment of hesitance on the warlock's part when he'd been reaching out to touch it. Tony had only proceeded after he'd given… A couple of things slid into place and Steve hoped, _really hoped _that he was jumping to the wrong conclusions. If he wasn't, he was very likely going to be sick.

Steve covered his face with his hands. This was such a mess. _He_ was a mess right now and he was utterly grateful that Clint had left to finish sorting out their supplies for the rest of the journey. Steve had the suspicion that Clint had consciously decided to give Steve some space to sort through today's revelations.

It would do them all a lot of good if he could sort this out but he couldn't. Not now. Now, all he felt like doing was sleep, despite the early hour. It wouldn't hurt to indulge in some escapism for a short while, would it? Steve sighed. No, he probably should not sleep as it would mess up his entire sleep cycle, which hadn't always been the best since Bucky. Now that they were entering the last leg of the journey, he would need a good amount of rest to keep himself fit and alert. Instead, he decided that he should take a walk around town and hopefully clear his mind since brooding in the room wasn't doing wonders for him.

The fresh air was doing well for him and the snacks he'd bought were delicious. So he did not expect to round a corner into the town square to catch sight of Tony and Janet van Dyne chatting away amicably on one of the benches. Tony looked really happy, carefree, and he was even laughing at something that Janet had said. Something twisted in Steve's gut. Maybe some of the food he ate had gone bad.

Without going by to say hello, Steve left, heading back to the inn. Whatever calm he had gotten from his walk around town had been disturbed once more. He couldn't quite understand why the sight of Tony and his lady friend affected him so and resolved to figure it out before unconsciously hurting Tony again.

* * *

Surprisingly, his meeting with Jan did him some good. Jan asked him questions that he had expected and Tony answered them all as honestly as he could, and was glad to find out that he hadn't been wrong about her. Jan took everything in stride, told him that his father was not in town (to which he had breathed a mental sigh of relief, because, with the new resolve to face down his past or not, coming face-to-face with Howard Stark was a whole different matter) and then segued into sharing what was going on in her life. Tony's main take away from that was that Henry Pym needed to get his eyes checked if he couldn't see how smitten Jan was for him. He had fun teasing Jan about it.

It took his mind off of his teammates and it hadn't actually hurt as much when he heard about the things that he had missed since he cut ties with the Starks and everyone related to them. When he finally parted ways with Jan, Tony realized that he was going to miss her and resolved to keep in contact.

Later that night, after a quiet dinner with Bruce and Natasha, Tony found himself unable to sleep despite his exhaustion. While catching up with Jan had done him good, he was still mentally tired over dealing with his friends finding out about his true identity. Now that he could and _should _rest, sleep was evading him. It wasn't an unusual occurrence but it was annoying nonetheless.

His mind was still running on high gear, as it always was. But tonight, it was looping in circles around the issue of Steve. Although both Clint and Peggy hadn't showed up for dinner as well, he found himself fixating on the paladin and there was just a bit of hurt mixed in with the memory of tonight's dinner. Why?

Deciding to start from the top, Tony made a chronological mental list of his interactions with Steve and the accompanying feelings they stirred in him. There was the initial physical attraction, because Tony wasn't blind and he was allowed to find the blond handsome, and that attraction hadn't waned in the slightest even after the disastrous encounter in his workshop. Then there was their harmony in combat. Even when tensions were still high between them, it had still left him riding on a high that he'd initially attributed to adrenaline, but on hindsight, Tony thought that it might not entirely be due to that. The _real_ mess of feelings had started on the day they'd met Bruce, when Steve had almost killed himself healing him and after that, they finally started properly behaving like friends did…

…

No. No way.

But if he factored in how worried he'd been about Steve, and truthfully how only Steve's potential reactions had mattered upon discovering his identity as Howard Stark's son, and how hurt he still keenly felt when Steve hadn't showed much of a response to the said revelation… And Bruce – observant, perceptive Bruce – had recognized it before Tony had…

Oh hell no.

"Of course," he muttered to himself, burying his face into the pillows. "Of course Tony Stark would fall for the one person least likely to love him back and realize it only after things have gone to hell. Again."

The next morning and the days after that only seemed to further prove his realizations right. He couldn't even deny how much pain it caused him when Steve found ways to put off being around him alone for extended periods of time. It wasn't too obvious because now that there was barely any proper civilization between them and the fortress, there wasn't that much privacy to speak of when everyone was camping together in the outdoors. Still, Tony could read awkwardness in Steve's words and the tension in his body (and wasn't that just another sign of how attuned he now was to the other man), so he just stopped seeking the paladin out. He didn't even realize that there was a part of him that had hoped that Steve would notice and then seek _him _out instead, until Steve never did.

It became slightly more obvious to Tony that Steve was deliberately distancing himself when even Peggy and Clint were being normal around Tony, not seeming to care about the lies he'd told them. Of course, they could just be better at compartmentalization but he would never be sure. He supposed that at least Steve's distance wasn't affecting battle situations. Instead, it was now even starker (ha, what was his life when even an unintentional pun hurt?) that whatever closeness and camaraderie shared on the field fled nigh instantly once it was over, leaving him feeling even emptier than when they'd first started out.

Tony hadn't wished for the contents of the wine cellars he had in his mansion _this _hard in ages.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 6_

"A hydra. _Of course_ a cult calling itself _HYDRA_ would have a pet hydra!" Clint groaned melodramatically, even though in this case, it was quite justifiably warranted.

Before the group of six, a huge twelve-headed beast had reared out of the deceptively calm, cold marshes, jaws snapping menacingly at them. They were definitely not going to be able to proceed without killing it and not without going about doing so with some form of a strategy. Luckily, they had good and knowledgeable tacticians with them.

"The heads are its most vulnerable parts," Steve announced. "We'll have to cut them off and then sear the neck stumps with fire before the two new heads regrow. Bruce and Peggy, we'll need your fire magic for that, so conserve your spells. Tony, your blasts can be modified to cause fire damage, so help out whenever you can, but I want you, Clint and Natasha to be mainly in charge of distracting the heads for me."

"Right, no transforming this time for me," Bruce acknowledged, and the others showed their understanding of the plan too.

"Have enough fire spells on hand?" Tony asked.

Bruce smiled, "More than enough." Then turning serious, he added in a softer voice so nobody else would – hopefully – overhear, "Tony, you should sit this one out. It's going to be a prolonged fight with a monster this big. You and I both know that you shouldn't be using your abilities as much as you already have."

"We're so close, Bruce. I can't just stop fighting here!"

"It's precisely _because _we're so close to their fortress. We can't have you fall now, Tony. Honestly though, I don't even think you should've joined Steve on this quest since you already knew about _that." _Bruce gestured vaguely to Tony's chest. "I don't know how you explained it away to Steve that day when you fell from the sky but I'm surprised he still hasn't stopped you from going into battle."

"Going to miss me if I die?" Tony joked, not wanting to deal with what Bruce had said about Steve.

The wizard's eyes hardened. "Don't joke about that. You're the first person to be my friend since I got bitten. The beast acknowledges that too. You're all… _pack_ to him, especially you Tony."

"Bruce…"

"At least promise me that you'll use that crossbow I know you have instead of your powers today, Tony."

"I… Okay, okay Bruce," Tony agreed a little reluctantly. "But if it turns out that I have to fly around to play decoy, I'll still do it."

Bruce sighed but nodded in acquiescence, probably knowing that it was the best he could hope to get out of Tony.

* * *

It turned out that the hydra was a variation of the normal ones since it could breathe out jets of frost, which complicated matters a little as they had to be careful not to end up frozen. A couple of times someone had to jump out of the way of a rain of frost, abandoning their task of distraction or decapitation.

Peggy and Bruce stayed behind the frontlines so that the hydra's attention was less focused on them, letting loose fire spells whenever required. As they both could use ranged weapons, they still chipped in to help distract the hydra from Steve's progress of chopping off their heads. Natasha and Clint worked in tandem to distract and injure the hydra's main body. Injuring the main body was slow going that way because hydras had the innate ability to rapidly heal wounds dealt to their bodies, so the main attack force was really all up to how fast Steve could slice off heads. Tony flew around, using that as a distraction maneuver as well as watching out for everyone else. Specifically Steve, but he hoped that the paladin wouldn't really notice that.

Thus far, he'd stuck to using his crossbow, in deference to Bruce's request. He had yet to see the need to chip in with a modified blast of power as Peggy and Bruce seemed to always know when Steve had successfully sundered a neck of the beast. In fact, Bruce was probably reacting even faster than Peggy most of the time, which Tony attributed to the wizard looking out for him and making sure Tony did not have to use more invocations than the one he used to maintain flight.

By this time, five of the twelve heads had been sliced off and the stumps dealt with. Instead of retreating, the hydra seemed to get even more agitated and angry. Its attacks were becoming wilder and more reckless, and Tony had had to do some fancy rolls in the air to get out of reach of a violently flailing head as well as swooping down to lift Clint away from being cornered by two heads. For someone who favored long-distance combat, Clint seemed to have a knack for becoming embroiled in close combat.

"You know, I thought archers preferred standing further away from the enemies they're trying to hit," Tony commented as he picked up Clint. "And I really do _not _need to be holding you any more than required, thanks."

"Haha, Stark. Don't live in denial. You can't wait to- Ouch! Artemis!"

The hawk, which was well-trained enough to stay out of the way of most battles, had suddenly appeared to peck her master sharply on his fingers. There was also what looked to be a disapproving glare in Artemis' eyes if that look were to be transposed onto a human's face.

"I think your lady hawk here knows you don't need to be that close to your enemies. Which proves my point, Barton."

"Shut up."

Following that, it was going well until Tony saw that one of the three remaining heads was about to breathe a jet of ice onto Steve and the paladin was too concentrated on hacking off another head to notice the one coming up behind him. Immediately, Tony sent out a blast of his own, modified to have the same intensity of flame as ice that the hydra was breathing out. The heat from his attack melted the frost cloud into a mini rain cloud that harmlessly splattered onto Steve and did nothing to deter the paladin from successfully decapitating another of the hydra's heads. A fireball from Peggy came almost immediately after, cauterizing the new stump and rendering it incapable of regenerating more heads.

The hydra roared in pain and probably anger at having its attack thwarted and the two heads made for Tony, trying to sandwich him between their snapping jaws. He spiraled backwards and away but the beast was not deterred, and so he was forced to send out another blast mixed with a fire invocation to keep both heads at bay. He was saved from having to use more of his warlock powers by Bruce pelting one head with crossbow bolts and Clint taking out its eyes, while Natasha somehow managing to clamber onto the other's neck and drive multiple daggers into the hide, leaving them in there so that the beast wasn't able to heal the wounds.

When the hydra finally crashed to the ground with all its heads felled, it was met with cheers from everyone. It had been a particularly arduous battle and they were now all exhausted, if elated at their success. This had been their most challenging fight to date and they had all gotten through it mostly unscathed.

Tony wouldn't be able to explain it in a sufficiently convincing manner to anyone later but he was abruptly overcome with a sense of wrongness. A glint of light flashed from a tree on the far end of the marsh and Tony was flying full tilt towards Steve, driven by instinct that something was _really wrong _and fear for the blond. He angled himself so that he stopped in front of Steve and barely a millisecond after that, an arrow pierced through the minute gap between the metal plates of his armor, deep into his chest. He had a moment of clarity to appreciate just how good the marksman had to be to make such a shot hit its target before he felt the pain from the wound. Was there poison coated on it? Because there really shouldn't be _this _much pain from a wound not all that deep. Then he was losing hold of the invocation that kept him in the air and just trying to catch his breath.

"Tony!"

Someone called his name and his forward momentum was broken by someone catching him before he could crash. He realized that someone in question was actually Steve and a sense of panic welled up inside of him. Not Steve, not Steve. Steve had to get away because the marksman, whoever he was, had definitely been aiming for the paladin. He'd missed once because Tony had gotten in the way, but Tony was sure the enemy wouldn't hesitate to fire again.

"Go… away… Target… you," Tony managed to slur out.

"I'm not leaving you like this! The rest of them have it covered."

Tony turned his head a little to see the shape that was Clint, standing protectively in front of them, his arrow nocked and pointing in what was probably the direction where the other arrow had come from. The Bruce-like shape had his hands spread out in front of him, a protective barrier forming around them. The smaller, dark shape topped with red was Natasha who was slowly stalking around, on alert for more enemies, which meant that the last blurry figure next to him was Peggy who was kneeling beside him and opposite Steve, the beginnings of a healing spell making her palms glow a soft blue-white.

"It's going to be all right, Tony," Peggy murmured. Then to Steve, she said firmly, "On my count, pull out the arrow. Do it hard and fast so the entire arrow comes out, including the tip of it. As soon as it's out of Tony, I'll start the spell."

"Got it," Steve said, his voice sounding serious as if he were on a mission.

"Okay. Bear with it Tony, it's going to hurt," Peggy warned. Then, "One, two, three!"

A choked scream found its way out of Tony's mouth as the arrow came completely free of his body, whatever poison on it intensifying the pain that shot through his nerves. Then the blue-white light came closer and with it, a gentle, calming sensation filled Tony, as if there was someone carefully, tenderly caressing him. The sharp pain from the open wound started to ebb as his tissues knitted back together and Tony felt like he could breathe again as the fast-acting poison was cleansed by Peggy's superior healing magic.

It took him a while, several moments too long, to realize that Steve was being unusually quiet. Tony would have expected the paladin to start fussing over him, asking him questions at least. But no, Steve wasn't making a sound. Angling his head to the side where Steve was, Tony looked at the man. And then blinked a few times for good measure to make sure his chest wound hadn't, illogically, messed up his vision permanently.

Steve was staring at the metal arrow tip, still stained with Tony's blood, with a look of abject horror.

* * *

Steve could not believe what he was seeing. The metal tip of the arrow that he'd pulled out of Tony's chest… he knew that design. Specifically, he knew that little mark etched into the metal tip, a stylized "B". Steve hadn't seen this mark in ages, hadn't believed that he would ever see it again. But there it was, staring back at him on the bloodstained arrow.

No, it couldn't be. Yet Steve had no illusions that the shot that had hit Tony, so precisely through the tiny gap in between the armor plating was something only Bucky could've done.

The implications of that… The implications…

"Steve? Steve, are you okay?" Peggy's concerned voice cut through his thoughts.

He looked up at the brunette, and wondered what his expression must be to cause a deeper frown on her face. Was he okay? No, no he wasn't.

"Peggy… I… No, I'm… not. This…" He didn't know how better to explain it, wasn't sure he even wanted to, and so he held out the arrow to Peggy and then murmured, "Look at the arrow tip."

Peggy stared hard at it and Steve knew the second she had seen the inscription when she gasped. "Steve, this… this mark… Isn't it…?"

"Bucky…" he breathed out, confirming to the both of them that yes, it was indeed what they'd thought upon seeing the little engraving.

"You know the person who was aiming for you?" Tony asked, and even through his shock, Steve could hear the faint trace of concern in the warlock's voice.

Even so, he couldn't bring himself to answer, because… because he didn't _know _the answer. The mark was Bucky's signature but there was no way, no possible way for it to be Bucky's. It just couldn't be possible. Steve had seen Bucky fall and he had been unable to do anything about it.

"James "Bucky" Barnes was a soldier in the Mainheim army and Steve's childhood friend. When Steve became a paladin, Bucky would accompany him on his journeys. Three years ago, Bucky had fallen off the mountain ridge where we had been ambushed by HYDRA. There wasn't a way for us to search for him, and we'd thought him dead ever since," Peggy explained for him before the silence could get too long.

"This is his?" Clint asked, gesturing to the arrow Steve was still holding onto.

"The mark on the metal tip. Bucky always etched his signature on to them," Steve replied softly.

"Could HYDRA be messing with you because they know of your past with Barnes?" Clint asked.

"Bucky was good with many weapons but he favored archery. That shot… He could've made it hit," Steve said. "And it did hit, just that it wasn't… me."

Natasha suddenly kneeled in front of Steve, looking to catch his downcast eyes. When she did, she asked, "May I look at the arrow?"

Steve nodded, loosening his hold on the arrow so that she could take it. Natasha studied the etching carefully, a little frown forming on her face.

"This… looks to be the Winter Soldier's," she finally announced grimly.

"The Winter Soldier?" Peggy repeated.

"Yes. He… When I said that I used to be a spy and assassin, I worked for HYDRA and was known as the Black Widow," Natasha said.

There was a stunned silence and even Tony seemed surprised, before Clint broke it by saying neutrally, "Well, that explains how you seem to know your way really well around the HYDRA bases we've busted."

"Most of the bases are built with the same concept. But my point is that I've met the Winter Soldier before and worked with him a few times. He preferred sniping from afar and his arrows had always had that etching. If HYDRA had called him in, then they're starting to take us seriously."

"I didn't think that assassins were in the habit of handling each other's weaponry," Peggy commented lightly.

"I had to clean up after him sometimes, when we couldn't afford to leave the slightest of tracks. We were also… close, in our own way."

"When was the first time you heard of him?" Peggy asked.

There was a chance, a slight one that Natasha had known of this Winter Soldier before Bucky's death and that the arrow's inscription was just a coincidence.

"Winter, three years ago. I thought that the mark was of his call sign, a 'W' with a slash through it."

"You didn't ask?" Clint more or less stated.

"There wasn't a need to know anything personal about him and it's easier to be compromised if too much of the real person behind the spy is known. He wouldn't have told me even if I had asked."

Bucky had fallen into the depths of that unforgiving ravine in autumn, three years ago. Steve, as had Peggy, had been hoping that the Winter Soldier had been around before that. It was possible that Natasha hadn't known of the other man up until then but the Black Widow was known to the Church as one of HYDRA's longest, most competent and trusted subordinates before she had mysteriously vanished from HYDRA and the Church's sights a year or so ago. It was unlikely for her to be uninformed about a new specialist recruit immediately. It was an idea that Steve did not want to consider but had to, in the face of the information he had.

"Bucky fell in autumn, three years ago," Steve murmured, and from the broken tone in his voice, he knew that they would come to the same conclusions that he had.

What he couldn't get his mind around was why Bucky would _work for HYDRA_. It was incomprehensible. It was _impossible._

"Can you describe his appearance, Natasha?" Peggy requested.

"He's about Steve's height, just a little shorter, with dark brown hair and eyes."

"That does sound like Bucky," Peggy murmured, a slight downwards twist of her lips now visible.

"Why would… Why would Bucky…"

"I may have an answer," Bruce spoke up, drawing everyone's attention to him. "There is a very advanced spell under the School of Enchantment that is able to alter a person's memory. Used by a skilled mage, it can completely rewrite a person's memories of his past. If this Winter Soldier is indeed your friend, then he might have been made to forget his actual past."

"So there may be nothing of the Bucky we knew left?" Peggy asked after a period of contemplative silence, a slight waver in her voice belying her calm expression.

"Perhaps," Bruce said. "It all depends on the skill of the person who cast it as well as the strength of will of the recipient."

"Bucky has one the strongest wills among the people I know," Steve said forcefully. "He… he would have resisted the spell. I know he would have."

"I don't want to be the bearer of bad news, Steve," Clint said hesitantly but still uncompromisingly, "But HYDRA would probably have been torturing him and doing everything they could to wear him down. Eventually, even the strongest break."

"It just _can't._"

"He'll appear again," Natasha said quietly. "The Winter Soldier doesn't fail on his missions. You'll find out once and for all if he really is your friend then."

The rest of the day passed mostly in a blur for Steve. He wasn't sure when the sky had turned into a riot of dark reds and purples when the sun set until he finally noticed that they had all stopped, and around him, their camp had been more or less set up. Wordlessly, he entered one of the tents to deposit his belongings, only to come up short as he was face-to-face with Tony.

Steve froze, the numb bubble that had formed around him since the discovery of the arrow popping all of a sudden. He remembered that Tony had been hit. Tony had pushed him out of the way. That arrow had been meant for him, and he had gotten so caught up with it that he hadn't checked up on his injured friend, much less thanked him for saving Steve's life. Then there was the fact that things were now a little awkward between them, what with him still not being too sure about how to treat Tony.

He winced a little but regretted that action immediately. Tony's surprised expression clouded over with hurt before the warlock forced a parody of a smile onto his face. Damn it, he was just making everything worse.

"Oh hey, Steve. If you want this tent, I can move."

"No, don't. It's okay, you don't have to move. I… I just, I didn't even ask if you were alright."

"I'm fine. Peggy has magical hands."

Steve knew how bad the situation between him and Tony really was when Tony's attempt at a double entendre fell flat because of the forced cheer in the other man's voice. Not to mention the fact that Tony was still looking tense and very ready to leave. He really should have listened to Peggy when she had very pointedly told him, just the previous day, to stop using flimsy excuses to avoid interacting with Tony.

"Will… will you stay? I mean, if you want to."

"Yeah, okay."

Silence pervaded the space between them as Steve went about settling in the tent and Tony fiddled with something. Despite that, Steve slowly felt himself allaying just a little. It was inexplicable but it felt good. He realized that it had been too long since he had just been in Tony's presence. Guilt welled up in him but before he could start berating himself, there was a gentle touch on his shoulder that made him look at Tony.

"Hey, let's take a walk," Tony suggested.

There was a set to his features that made Steve think that even if he refused, the warlock would just keep asking until he caved. That and knowing how often he'd been brushing off Tony made Steve agree.

They exited the tent and Tony gave the rest of the team a rather flimsy excuse of going off to gather some more firewood (because everyone knew Tony disliked such "menial labor" and would never willingly do it without some form of protest first) before they set off deeper into the forest. Steve didn't know where they were going and he wasn't sure Tony did either, but the walk was nice and filled with a companionable silence. When they reached a small clearing where the evening sky was visible, Tony stopped and looked up at the cloudless sky, still faintly lit up by the dying rays of sunlight.

"I'm sorry," came the non-sequitur.

"What? Why are you apologizing, Tony?"

But Tony talked over him. "I knew you wanted me to trust you but clearly I didn't because, well pretty much the biggest secret of my life is my actual identity. And you know my dad, and now you know I didn't get along with him even before. So I don't know. I hope it's not awkward for you now whenever you see him again. Just, please don't tell him you've met me? Jan was one thing but I'm really not ready to see my dad just yet."

"I won't, Tony. I-"

"So, well, I didn't quite trust you… and I know this will be a bit hypocritical, because well, it's coming from _me_. But… but I guess I just wanted you to know that if you need someone to listen to, you, you can… Well, there's me. If you want."

"Tony-"

"And if you don't, I understand perfectly too! I mean-"

"Tony," Steve tried to get a word in, not liking the sudden tense set of the warlock's shoulders as if he was going to fly away if Steve didn't do anything.

"-ha, it's me right? Actually, you know what? I think I should just-"

"Tony! Tony, just _listen_ to me!" he finally said loudly as he placed his hands on the other man's shoulders, spinning him around so that Tony was looking at him and not at the sky.

Tony shut up and tried his best not to meet Steve's eyes, his gaze seeming to hover somewhere above Steve's left shoulder. It wasn't ideal but it would do for now.

"Tony, thank you for offering, for reaching out to me even when I haven't exactly been a very good friend to you recently. No, don't interrupt me. Just listen, okay?" he said firmly, still not letting go of the other man for fear that he would try to run. "I should not have reacted the way I had. I was in shock but even when I came to terms with what I had learnt about you, I still kept my distance and I shouldn't have done that. I'm not angry at you, not even right after you told us who you were. How could I? I just realized that I had unknowingly hurt you and I didn't want to do it again. But clearly I failed because I was too caught up worrying about what I should do that I didn't realize that I was doing it already and for that, _I'm_ sorry."

"Steve, no, why… why are _you_ apologizing?"

Knowing that if he didn't stop Tony somehow, they would be running circles around this topic, so Steve said, "_Tony._ Let's just agree that both of us feel that we have something to apologize for and accept each other's apology, okay?"

Now, Tony was looking straight at him, his brown eyes seemingly boring into Steve's soul. The dwindling light that cast shadows over Tony's features, strangely, did not serve to make the warlock appear sinister, but rather seemed to make him more mysterious and yet fascinating all at the same time…

Oh.

_Oh._

"Well, okay, fine," the warlock acknowledged, oblivious to Steve's epiphany. "This wasn't supposed to be about me anyway. So I guess the question is how are you feeling, if you still want to talk about it…?"

Compartmentalization. He should do that. He _needed _to do that, immediately, before Tony read the wrong idea from his stunned silence. He and Tony already had so many misunderstandings under their belt that he didn't want to add any more, especially if it was preventable. So Steve packed away his realizations and feelings (_for Tony_) into a mental box and shoved it into a mental cupboard and tried not to dwell on how his mental cupboard looked like the one in the guestroom he stayed in at Tony's mansion.

"Yes, I… I think it would be good to talk," he replied, settling himself on the ground and tugging Tony along gently so that the other man would sit down next to him as well.

Then he started talking about Bucky, something he hadn't done since Bucky's apparent fall down the snowy valley three years ago. He told Tony that Bucky was his first and best friend; that Bucky stuck by him and defended him whenever he mouthed off to bullies thrice his size; that even after his change – a blessing granted to him by the God of War himself – Bucky never stopped treating him differently and instead left the army to join Steve on his new journey as a paladin. He told Tony about how devastated he had been when he saw Bucky fall; how hard Peggy had worked to prevent him from self-destructing in grief; and how he had borne a grudge against HYDRA ever since. He admitted to Tony that he saw the truth in Clint's words that even the strongest of wills – and Bucky was plenty willful and stubborn – would break eventually. But he still hoped it really wasn't Bucky that had become one of HYDRA's best the Winter Soldier.

"I'm afraid of meeting the Winter Soldier. I want Bucky to be alive but if they're really one and the same…"

"It's okay to be afraid, Steve. If they do turn out to be the same person, I- we'll all be with you, be there for you."

"Thank you, Tony."

"You're very welcome, though I think we should get back to camp now. With some firewood, just to make our excuse seem more legitimate."

"I think they all know we weren't actually gathering firewood."

"Oh shush, they definitely thought we were!"

Steve could not help but smile at the easy flow of banter between him and Tony as they set about collecting kindling. Things were, perhaps, slightly complicated by his newly-discovered feelings for the warlock, but there was one thing that he was certain about. He was not going to let anything disrupt his friendship with Tony. Whether or not Tony would ever reciprocate with more than just friendship did not matter as much, and for now, he was content with the status quo.

* * *

It was a sign of how much his being currently revolved so much around Steve when after making up with the said man, Tony felt refreshed and buoyed by it all that nothing seemed to be able to get him down. Bruce had remarked on it, but he had a pleased smile on his face so Tony didn't mind it much.

Still, peaceful traveling had now become a thing of the past since the encounter with the hydra beast. HYDRA was beginning to get nervous about their approach, if the cult throwing more roadblocks in the way were any indication. Interestingly enough, while they started having daily skirmishes with a variety of HYDRA agents, the Winter Soldier was not present for any of it. Or if he were, he did not announce his presence in any way. Tony was more inclined to believe that it was the former reason and wondered if it was because the assassin had failed to kill Steve.

Regardless, it was one less thing to worry about at the moment. He knew that Steve was not looking forward to coming face-to-face with the mysterious assassin and while he couldn't imagine what it must be like for the paladin, just imagining the Winter Soldier as _Rhodey _was enough to make Tony want to scream in denial.

Unfortunately, their luck did not hold and they finally met the infamous assassin.

As it was, it wasn't unexpected that it was Natasha who sensed him first. They had just dusted off another batch of HYDRA's forces when the redhead suddenly tensed and then in a motion that was nearly too fast for the human eye to track, disappeared. A screech of metal scraping against metal was heard. Tony turned towards the sound to see one of Natasha's blades locked with another dagger that was held by a tall man dressed in light black armor with a similarly-colored mask covering the lower half of his face.

"Widow. You look well," the man spoke calmly, voice slightly muffled by the mask.

He seemed wholly unconcerned that he was facing off against the Black Widow (and yes, this was Natasha in _Black Widow mode_, never mind that this was the first time that Tony had truly seen the assassin in Natasha) and that he was essentially surrounded by an armed group that had their weapons pointed at him.

"James. You knew better than to go without double checking."

For a split second, there seemed to be a softening of the lines of the Winter Soldier's eyes before the cold, blank look was back. "I'm not here to reminisce the past."

Tony knew from the last time Natasha had spoken about the Winter Soldier that they'd been intimate. Now, it seemed that the other assassin had been the one sent to eliminate Natasha when she'd decided to defect and hadn't completed the job. It was interesting to say the least and if the situation wasn't so tense, he would've been teasing Natasha about it. It was also interesting to note that the Winter Soldier wasn't a completely obedient dog to HYDRA. Hadn't Steve said that Bucky could be pretty wilful?

"Then what are you here for?" Steve's voice cut in before Natasha could reply, and Tony had to look at the paladin.

Steve was paler than normal, but his demeanor was still set in Captain mode. Tony had the feeling that Steve had identified the Winter Soldier as the best friend he thought he had lost three years ago. A quick glance at Peggy confirmed that deduction beyond doubt. Despite having confided to Tony that he was afraid of meeting the Winter Soldier, Tony felt that Steve was doing a good job at holding on to his composure. It was then completely natural for Tony to drift slightly closer to the paladin in a show of support he'd promised Steve that night.

The male assassin's eyes zeroed in on Steve despite Natasha still hampering his movements and possibly moving to strike him when his attention was diverted. He seemed uncaring of the potential danger he was in.

"Captain Steven Rogers. Pleasure to meet you. I don't normally get to say that to my marks but then you _did _manage to evade me."

Perhaps it was because he was now extremely attuned to Steve, Tony noticed the fine tremor that was starting up in Steve's tightly clenched hands and how the paladin had unconsciously switched to holding his shield defensively in front of him. Seeing the lack of recognition his old friend had for him was a blow to Steve, who so dearly wanted to believe that HYDRA had not managed to brainwash his old friend completely.

"You… you don't…"

There was a blur of movement and then suddenly, the Winter Soldier was in front of Steve who had just brought his shield up in time to block the twin daggers that were now in the HYDRA assassin's hands. Natasha was cursing more foully than Tony had ever heard, even as the pointed end of her blade was repositioned back against the Soldier's back. Tony hadn't even realized that there existed a person that _could _give the Black Widow the slip in such short order, and that just highlighted how skilled the Winter Soldier was.

"You've gotten soft, Widow," the man murmured. Then in a louder voice directed at Steve, he added calmly, "I was told you were a menace to HYDRA. You don't seem very threatening. Or capable."

"_James._"

Natasha's voice was a low, dangerous hiss but perhaps Tony could sort of see where the Winter Soldier was coming from. In her past, the Widow would've plunged the knife into the Soldier's back regardless of past allegiances instead of holding it there as a threat. But that could also be because Natasha had noticed Peggy and Steve's reaction and knew that Bucky and the Winter Soldier were one and the same, and was holding back for their sakes.

Then there was what had been said to Steve and it cemented the fact that the Winter Soldier truly did not remember his old best friend. Tony couldn't see Steve's expression right now but he had the feeling that the blond wasn't going to be able to hold on to his shaky composure much longer.

"You don't remember me, Bucky?"

The masked man looked at Steve, eyes narrowed for a moment. "I don't know who you're talking about."

"You're James "Bucky" Barnes. You were born in Mainheim. You were my neighbor and we've been best friends for years. I thought you _died._"

"You're mistaken, Captain. I've never been to Mainheim unless it was to kill someone."

Then deeming it was enough conversation to be had, the Soldier twisted out of the standoff between him and Steve, narrowly avoiding Natasha's knifepoint. He dodged an arrow from Peggy and deflected the one from Clint, which would've gotten him in the eye otherwise. A lightning bolt struck the metal chain shirt the brunet had on but it barely caused him to flinch. Tony followed almost instantaneously with an eldritch blast of his own (power toned down a little because this _was _Bucky Barnes even if the man didn't remember it and Bucky was important to Steve) and though it hit the assassin squarely and sent him down to the ground, the man just rolled with it and was up again like it was nothing.

How in the world…?

Natasha was moving in, looking like she might actually be going with the intent to kill instead of incapacitate, when Steve was suddenly between her and the Winter Soldier.

"Stand down. The rest of you, _all _of you. Let me handle this."

Despite how firm Steve sounded now, Tony refused to believe that the paladin wasn't shaken. He opened his mouth to protest, "Steve-"

"Let me handle this," Steve repeated clearly, his tone firm and just the slightest bit stubborn in the "I-dare-you-to-challenge-me" way. "This is between me and Bucky."

Then to the Soldier himself, Steve added, "I hope you have no objections."

"Other than the fact that I'm not who you think I am, none whatsoever. You were my target after all and I should thank you for making my job easier."

As everyone else reluctantly backed away, the two men began to circle each other warily. Tony noted that Bruce had a spell readied, able to be launched at any moment, just like how Tony was gathering energy to blast as soon as an opportunity arose. Natasha still had her daggers on hand. Peggy looked faintly stricken and she was grasping her holy star symbol but it was in a manner that indicated she had a spell on hand despite still reeling from the proof that her friend was alive but brainwashed. Clint was the only one who hadn't obviously put away his weapon, his arrow still nocked. It seemed that they all had the same idea and for that, Tony felt a swell of warmth for this group of people that he found himself surrounded by.

They all had Steve's back. They all had each other's back. That was more than Tony had ever expected to happen to him.

* * *

It _was _Bucky. The Winter Soldier really was Bucky. Joy at knowing that his best friend hadn't died warred with the despair of knowing that Bucky didn't remember and thought he was the enemy. As their wary circling turned into an exchange of blows, most of which was Steve defending and pulling his punches because _it was Bucky_, he couldn't help but try to reach out to the other man.

He tried to jog Bucky's memory, tried to mention things that had happened that only they knew about, including some embarrassing moments that he hoped his current friends would not remember. A part of him was warmed by how they still circled around him, and he knew despite his order to stand down, they were all ready to jump in if required. The much larger part of him was concerned with Bucky.

At one point, he even brought up Peggy again and how Bucky had tried to flirt with her but was shot down so efficiently that even Bucky himself had been impressed. To that, the brunet's impassive expression seemed to turn into one of amusement as his gaze darted to Peggy for a second.

"Any man would flirt with her, Captain," he said. "Most would have been shot down."

Steve started slightly at the strangely sure tone from the other man and then noticed how Bucky himself seemed to have realized what he said as a furrow appeared between his brows. That, that actually sounded like something Bucky from before would say and would also know for a certainty, having been shot down by Peggy himself and then subsequently witnessing it happening to other men. Steve could not stop the slight bit of hope from rising up.

"Bucky?"

That seemed to snap the other man out of whatever he was thinking about. An object materialized in his hand which was promptly thrown down onto the floor. Smoke and dust erupted from it, obscuring Steve's vision. From the shouts of surprise he heard, the range of the smoke bomb must have been wider than he thought. He tensed, sharpening his concentration to be ready for any sneak attacks.

"See you around, Captain," Bucky's voice drifted over to him.

"Wait!" he shouted, reaching blindly towards the direction where the voice came from.

He thought that his hand had, perhaps, brushed against something, but it could be his imagination. When the smoke cleared away, Bucky was gone.


	7. Chapter 7

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 7_

In the end, that first encounter with the Winter Soldier left everyone feeling more than a little confused. There did not seem to be a concrete reason why the assassin would retreat. He _was _outnumbered but it had been clear that he did not seem to be at a disadvantage because of it. So what had prompted the retreat?

It was a sticking point that Steve couldn't stop mulling over. He wondered if it was just wishful thinking that made him feel that it was a little sign of Bucky pushing through the Winter Soldier brainwashing – at the mention of Peggy – that had caused the sudden, illogical retreat. Had the other man felt something was… not quite right? That maybe he was doubting the veracity of his claims and beliefs?

The old Bucky was in there. He _was._ Steve refused to believe otherwise. He was almost certain that in the coming days, he would be seeing more of the Winter Soldier and he would need to pull it together. It had been quite a miracle in itself that he had walked away from this first encounter uninjured especially when, at the start, he'd been in a state of disbelief at Bucky's memory loss that he hadn't done much more than let trained reflexes react. His limbs had almost locked up the first time Bucky made a strike at him and really, that should _not _happen again.

Still, the thought of having to face off against Bucky, who currently seemed to have no qualms about killing him, made Steve's insides turn. Bucky was his best friend and though they had sparred in the past, there was never this distance between them. Never this threat that things could turn lethal if he let his guard down just the slightest bit.

He wanted to save Bucky. He had to.

"Steve?"

He startled slightly as he turned around to find Tony standing behind him, not having heard the warlock's approach. They had all stopped for the night, and he had wandered a little distance away from the campfire. He had sort of probably, well rather, _definitely_, been avoiding Peggy because he knew that she would be at once concerned for him and also ready to lecture him about not properly defending himself. He doubted he could escape Peggy for long, but well, he could hold off for a little longer.

"Hi Tony. Is there anything wrong?"

Tony huffed a small laugh. "That should be my line to you. Are _you_ okay?"

"Ye… well, not really. I just, I guess I really hoped that the Winter Soldier wasn't Bucky, or that if he _was_, he'd _remember._"

"Well, I'm sorry for that too. But at least he's alive?"

"I know and I'm thankful, but… We'll be seeing more of him."

"Yeah, I'm sure we will," Tony agreed. "Which… leads me to my next point. Steve, you can't. You can't act like that again. You weren't at your best and it was some minor miracle that you didn't get any more injured. _Don't_ order the rest of us to stand aside. I think we all know not to use lethal force. Well, maybe not Clint, but I'm sure he'll listen to you. He's probably just jealous of Natasha and-"

"Tony!"

"What?" the warlock protested, completely unabashed of what he'd implied. "You can't tell me you didn't suspect? Even a little? Just remember how she greeted him by name! And he almost smiled back at her despite the situation!"

"I try not to imagine what Bucky does in his spare time, okay?" Steve replied, but was unable from keeping himself from blushing. He just thanked the gods that the light wasn't very good at the moment. "I've… I've walked in on one too many encounters."

That sent Tony into peals of laughter and Steve couldn't help but smile in response. When the warlock finally sobered, there was still a bright twinkle in his eyes. "Well, okay, don't need to be so embarrassed, Steve. But just, don't act like you did today. Promise m- us that."

"Did Peggy send you here?"

"Yes and no. I _did_ want to talk to you but she did ambush me along the way. She may still come find you though. She seems to have a big lecture lined up. Reminds me of Pepper, she does."

"Thanks, Tony. I appreciate it."

It was then Tony's turn to look a little self-conscious. He never took honest, sincere compliments and gratitude well, a fact that Steve now found both endearing and exasperating. Still, Steve was glad that he had friends who truly cared for him.

"I guess I should return to the camp and let Peggy find me. Better to get it over quickly, don't you think?"

"Huh. Usually, I just run from Pepper as much as I can."

"How does that work out for you?"

"Not well?"

"Maybe you should try it my way next time."

"And give Pepper a heart attack? Nah."

* * *

Days later, they were finally approaching their destination. Up ahead, the HYDRA fortress loomed before them. It was a hulking, forbidding monstrosity constructed out of dark grey stones, situated at the foot of the mountain valley and built into the rocky, partially snow-covered valley side. It looked as unwelcome as the harsh climate of the northern mountain ranges were to visitors, fitting in that HYDRA would not want unsuspecting tourists trampling all over their base of operations. The bleak landscape added to how deserted the place appeared to be but Tony knew that it was all merely an illusion.

Even if HYDRA was extremely incompetent, the amount of damage his little band of travelers had caused the cult organization would not have gone unnoticed. Besides, they'd once employed Natasha's services and even if they'd lost their top spy, Tony did not doubt that they would still have a decent network of spies. This desolated stillness was manufactured, possibly hoping to lull them into a false sense of security. Or HYDRA wanted them to think that the base had been abandoned.

"It's too quiet," Clint muttered, and Tony saw Natasha nod in agreement.

"Keep up your guard. They know we're here," Natasha warned.

In the end, they made it right up to the tightly shut wood and steel gates without encountering a single HYDRA operative. It was highly unusual compared to how the cult had seemed to be desperately throwing obstacles in their way just a few days prior. The most resistance they'd faced was from Nature herself, manifesting in sudden gusts of buffeting winds, that seemed to be warning them against approaching the stronghold, as well as slippery areas of ice. This sudden cessation of activity and resistance gave Tony the feeling that HYDRA had something really sinister planned for them.

Steve and Peggy had started their journey up north because HYDRA had started making noticeable movements. However, despite the number of HYDRA outposts that they had taken out, they had not gotten all that closer to the cult's main objectives. Very little precious information had been left lying around in the smaller bases. Sure, world domination was on the cards but the question right now was how? How did HYDRA plan to do that?

The cult was amassing in numbers and over the past few years, there had been unsolved murders that they now knew were linked to HYDRA. But there did not look like the movements an organization set on domination would take. As far as they could determine, HYDRA did not have very many singularly powerful members, with the exception being the Winter Soldier (though he was used mainly for assassinations) and the wizard Arnim Zola. They were not enough to achieve HYDRA's goals. So what were they not seeing?

"So, do we knock politely or bust the door down?" Clint asked. "'Cause I'm sure they know we're here, either way."

As if in answer to Clint's question, the gates started to creak, opening outwards to reveal an empty and barren courtyard.

"Now, that's _not_ ominous at all," Tony commented with a raised eyebrow. "It's so obviously a trap."

Steve nodded. "But we're still going in anyway. Trap or not, this place was always our objective. Stay alert everyone!"

After they had all passed through the open gates, there was a sudden strong gust of wind that slammed the gates shut behind them. Tony turned around to see a shimmer gloss over the structure and he knew without even needing to delve into his magical senses that they were locked in for the foreseeable future. Not that they were planning on retreating from this juncture. Despite that, there was still no sign of any HYDRA personnel. Instead, the main doors to the fortress swung open as if beckoning them to go further into the black belly of the beast. As there was nowhere else to go but forge on inwards, they got into position, with Steve at point, and then ventured into the waiting darkness.

As soon as the last of them passed the threshold, the doors slammed shut and then flame torches flickered to life. Before them stood what appeared to be a near endless throng of HYDRA operatives and they barred any further advancement into the fortress.

"Well, shit," Tony muttered eloquently.

Then, the fighting began.

It was chaos. The men that HYDRA were throwing at them weren't particularly outstanding fighters, but there were so many of them and only five members on Tony's side. Sooner or later his side was going to tire out and become easy pickings for the HYDRA masses. It was then that Tony detected a wild fluctuation of magical energy emanating from somewhere further inside the compound. His eyes sought out Bruce and they met. Bruce too, had felt that phenomenon. It was even clearer now that HYDRA was deliberately trying to contain and stall them for some reason or another.

Tony took to the air, knowing that it was no longer the time to be cautious about his powers. He cleared a wide swath of enemy men that were surrounding his friends to give them a breather as Bruce hurriedly relayed what they both had just discovered.

"Someone will have to go on ahead to investigate what's happening," Bruce said just as Tony landed again, next to the wizard.

"I'll go," Tony said. "The nature of the energy is Chaos, so I'd be most suitable for that."

"You're not going in alone," Steve said, barreling on with his words before Tony could so much as protest. "There will be other agents further down, I'm sure of that. You'll need support to be able to get as far in as you can. Natasha and I will go with you."

"Steve, you're the only heavy hitter right now, unless…" Tony trailed off. "Bruce?"

While it would be good to have Bruce with him when they got close to the source of the magic, Tony was confident enough in his skills to be able to handle whatever nefarious, arcane scheme that HYDRA had in mind. So if Bruce was on board with staying behind, then…

"I'll be fine with transforming, Tony," Bruce assured him. "If I choose to let it happen, I can control myself. In this situation, I think my magic can take a backseat for now."

"The three of us will be more than enough to hold them all off _and _prevent them from getting in our way," Clint said with steely conviction.

"Get going," Peggy ordered even as she turned to fire off more arrows at the advancing personnel. "We can handle this."

No sooner had she spoken did Bruce begin his controlled transformation into his hybrid weretiger form. Then Bruce leapt directly into the way of the approaching HYDRA agents and rapidly cleared a path leading towards the other door at the far end of the room. Wordlessly, Tony, Steve and Natasha followed behind, and were out of the door and into the hallway. The door slammed shut again and a loud roar was heard. Tony could imagine Bruce standing guard by the door, daring any of the men to try and get past him to go after them.

"Alright then, let's go," Tony said.

He'd already gotten a lock on the where the chaotic energy was coming from and it was easy to just let his senses guide him along. He could even focus better because with Steve and Natasha flanking him, he knew they had his back and could look out for any incoming threats. Tony was careful, however, to make sure he didn't reflexively start to fly. He was now wary about how often he could use his powers before the damage to his heart would start really affecting him. Without a clear idea on what the magical flux meant, he needed to be careful with expending his powers because he would most certainly need to use them when they finally reached the source.

They had just entered another room when a by-now familiar figure dropped in front of them – the Winter Soldier. Immediately, Steve stepped forward, partially shielding both Tony and Natasha with his body. Tony was glad to note that there was no longer hesitation affecting Steve's posture, no more of that hurt and pain in Steve's stance like in the previous times they'd encountered the assassin, who always seemed to mysteriously withdraw. He didn't doubt that Steve would try to jog the other man's memory but the paladin appeared to be more inclined to knock out his friend-turned-foe and secure him before doing his best to attempt to subvert the brainwashing.

"Bucky."

"I've told you before, Captain. I'm not who you think I am."

Steve didn't bother with a rebuttal this time. "You going to stand in my way?"

In lieu of a verbal answer, the assassin lunged forward, weapons drawn. Steve met him halfway with a clang as shield and blade clashed. The paladin shot Tony and Natasha a look, tilting his head slightly to indicate that they should proceed without him.

For all that the Winter Soldier insisted that he had never known Steve, the other man was clearly drawn to Steve in some manner. It was now evident in how the assassin did not even make an attempt to intercept him and Natasha, despite clearly being able to see what they were planning. Had he wanted to, a man of the Winter Soldier's caliber could've done a lot more to try to disable Tony and Natasha before engaging Steve. He was, instead, solely focused on fighting Steve and had barely spared Tony or Natasha more than a passing glance. Tony hoped, for Steve's sake, that they could save Bucky from his brainwashing after all of this was over. Then he was running alongside Natasha, progressing deeper into the fortress and closer to the source of energy.

The further they went, the stronger Tony felt the energies. He knew it wasn't just because he was getting closer to the source. The amount of energy was increasing with time and he was just beginning to be able to identify the other fluctuations of energy. There was a spell at work… a summoning spell?

"Shit. I think it's a summoning spell I'm sensing. Maybe a ritual."

"How far along is it?"

"I can't be sure. This feels very complex. But it's definitely not complete yet."

"We'll need to hurry then," Natasha proclaimed.

"Care to take a ride?" Tony suggested seriously, though he still could not resist adding, "I'll try not to grope."

Flying the both of them would be faster, even if it would aggravate the effects of his curse again. But now that he knew what was happening, time was of the essence so that they could prevent the completion of the summoning. Besides, if they didn't stop it, there was a high chance that they would end up dead anyway.

Natasha responded by looping an arm firmly around his waist. "You wouldn't dare anyway."

"True."

"And you would rather grope someone else."

At this juncture, Tony wisely decided to shut up. He looped an arm around Natasha too and started his invocation. Then they were off, speeding down the hallways and heading unerringly towards the source of Chaos magic. He only slowed down when an open doorway came into view, choosing to land the both of them under the cover of some shadows a distance away from the open entryway. From this distance, he knew for certain that he had been right and that a summoning ritual was in progress.

This close to the swirling mass of energy forming, Tony could conclude that it was most definitely an extremely complex summoning ritual and the only person who could possibly be performing it had to be Arnim Zola. It did not take too much conjecture to conclude that, with this level of complexity and the length of time it was taking even for someone as powerful as Zola, a portal to the Underworld was being created for the Red Skull to manifest in the material plane.

Should they succeed, the world as they knew it would be _doomed._

"So remind me, which devil does HYDRA worship again?" Tony muttered to Natasha mostly rhetorically.

"The Red Skull," came the prompt reply. "So it really _is_ a summoning ritual."

"Seems like that was their plan all long. HYDRA doesn't just worship the Red Skull and want world domination. They're making it possible for their devil to rule the material plane," he hypothesized. Then after a beat, he added, "So. It looks like I'll need to shut that down."

Natasha looked at him carefully, eyes narrowed. "Tony," she began to say.

"Save it, Natasha. Out of the two of us present, I'm the only one with the means to do anything. Bruce and Peggy are probably too far away to get here in time to help me. I'll need you to tell the rest that the Red Skull might pay a potential visit if things don't go according to plan."

Natasha's lips pursed into a thin, hard line. Tony could tell that she wasn't pleased with what she was hearing but knew that it was the logical course of action. She could stay and help him deal with Zola but on the off-chance that they couldn't stop the summoning, there needed to be a warning given to the rest of their friends. Forewarned is forearmed, after all.

"Don't get killed. I don't want to deal with the aftermath," she warned quietly.

"You can handle Pepper and Rhodey."

"I'm not just talking about them, Tony."

He elected to ignore the implications of that statement. "You don't trust me?"

"I don't trust you to look out for yourself."

"I'm really not planning to die, Natasha. I promise. I'm just saying that anything could happen. Trying to stop a ritual already underway is tricky and while I'm very good, I'm just taking precautions. Don't all of you say I don't take enough precautions normally? This is an improvement!"

Natasha gave him another long searching look, her expression still grim, as if ascertaining the veracity of his statement. "Come back out, Tony."

Then she was off, melting into the shadows, going back the way they came.

Tony smiled slightly, glad that in the end, Natasha still trusted him enough. He was being completely sincere though. He did not have a death wish and he would try his damn hardest to get back out alive. Then the smile slipped off his face as he steeled himself for what he was preparing to do. Right. He couldn't screw this up. The portal should not be opened.

"Alright. Showtime," he muttered to himself.

* * *

The fight between him and Bucky had, over time, degenerated into something that required less skill and was more akin to an all-out brawl. Steve had lost his shield to one corner of the room they were in and in the other far reaches of the room, lay a couple of daggers that Bucky had been relieved of. They were mostly throwing punches at each other by this point, though Steve wasn't going to believe that Bucky had run out of hidden knives.

He managed to flip Bucky down on to his back and almost winced in sympathy at the loud thud it made. However, Steve knew better than to let up. Whatever else HYDRA had done to Bucky other than manipulate his memories, it had made Bucky stronger and able to take more punishment than a normal human. Steve followed up by grappling the other man, attempting to pin him down.

"Why… are you fighting me?" he asked. "And only me."

Bucky grunted, trying to throw Steve off. "Orders."

"Really? To focus just on me?"

"…I _am _following my orders, technically."

There. That was yet another spark of Bucky's personality shining through the brainwashing. HYDRA may have brainwashed Bucky into thinking that he was a loyal soldier to the cult but Bucky had never been one to thoughtlessly follow orders. Authority issues had occasionally reared up when he had still been with the Mainheim army and Steve was hoping that their past few tussles had stirred up enough warning flags in Bucky's head that all wasn't what it seemed to be.

Steve grew more confident that even if it wouldn't be today, a method to break Bucky completely free of the spell HYDRA had used on him would be found eventually. If he had to knock the other man out to facilitate the process, then he would.

Bucky managed to free a hand and produced another knife from somewhere on his person. Steve had no choice but to let Bucky go so that he could flip away to avoid the sharp point of the blade. Bucky used the opportunity to swiftly get back up on his feet, and produced another hidden knife that he held in a readied stance. That left the two of them circling each other warily this time, looking for any gap in the other's guard to take advantage of.

"You were never one to blindly follow orders, Bucky. I'll bet _that_ got you into some trouble with HYDRA too. You know something's not right, don't you?"

The dark-haired man frowned slightly, as if he were mulling over Steve's words and wasn't liking the conclusion he was coming up with.

"I'll bet this wasn't the first time you doubted what they told you. I know you're Bucky, even if you don't remember it now. You've always had a strong will, was _stubborn_ even, and I _know _whatever they did to you wouldn't have held as well as they'd have liked it," he continued to speak, encouraged by the way that Bucky appeared to be really listening to him now. "You never give up despite overwhelming odds. I always felt you were kind of a hypocrite whenever you lectured me about not getting into situations with the odds stacked against me."

The frown on Bucky's face deepened and his brows furrowed. Slowly, almost as if he were unconscious of the movement, Bucky lowered his knives. Steve did not dare approach yet. Much as he hoped that he'd gotten through to his friend, he could not discount the possibility that it was an act and that the Winter Soldier was still at the forefront rather than Bucky.

"I… Ste-"

Steve had to force himself not to run over to Bucky when the first syllable of his given name slipped out of Bucky's lips. Not once had Bucky called him by his name, not even his surname, since they'd met on opposing sides of the field. It had always been "Captain", so this was either progress or really good acting.

But if it were acting, surely Bucky would've tried it earlier…?

Then he was snapped out of his hopeful musings when he heard metal clatter to the floor. Bucky had abruptly dropped his knives and his hands were now clutching his head. Steve stepped closer immediately, worry overriding any warning instinct.

"Bucky? What's wrong?"

"Ste- No, I'm not… _No!_" Bucky's fingers dug deeper into his hair, almost as if they were trying to dig through scalp and skull, and his voice was strained.

Unexpectedly, a lithe hand seemed to come out of nowhere from behind Bucky and Steve had to fight against an ingrained instinct to defend his old friend by intercepting. Steve could see a sharp, needle-like point held within Natasha's fingers that was then swiftly jabbed into the side of Bucky's neck. Bucky's eyes widened in surprised and he managed to turn slightly to catch sight of Natasha before his eyes rolled back in his head and he crumpled. Natasha caught the unconscious man and carefully slowed his downward momentum and guided him to the floor. Steve was next to them at once.

"I just knocked him out. Don't worry," Natasha assured him.

"Yeah, I know. Just…"

He hurriedly checked over Bucky because he couldn't help himself. He trusted Natasha, really, he did. It was just… It was _Bucky_ and he never thought he'd see Bucky again. Even whilst fighting him, Steve could never get over the fact that this was his friend and the deeply ingrained concern he had for him never really went away.

But he quickly got himself back together. The situation was not over yet. They were still within the belly of HYDRA's base. Natasha had been with Tony and for her to double back alone, it meant that something must have happened.

As if she'd read his mind, Natasha spoke, "Tony figured out that Zola is attempting to summon the Red Skull to the material plane. He wants us to be warned of that possibility, in case his attempt to disrupt the ritual goes wrong."

He was about to protest Natasha's decision to leave Tony alone to handle both Zola and the dissolution of the ritual but realized that there wasn't really any other way to go about doing this. The rest of the team had to be informed of HYDRA's plan and be ready just in case they had to fight HYDRA's patron devil and of the two of them, Tony had a greater chance of properly stopping the ritual.

"Alright," he said instead. "We'll need to get the news to the others. I'll take Bucky, you go on ahead."

"He'll be out for a long while, Steve. But I promise it doesn't have any lasting effects," she said before swiftly disappearing ahead of him.

Steve went to collect his shield and then crouched to pick up Bucky, slinging his friend over his shoulder and adjusting the weight so that he could still have some maneuverability if they were ambushed by HYDRA agents. He thought it was unlikely but it was best to be prepared. He glanced back at the door that led deeper into the fortress and sent a prayer for Tony's safe return before departing through the opposite door.

He wasn't going to accept an outcome that did not have Tony walking out of this alive. HYDRA had taken Bucky from him and he'd been lucky enough to get his friend back alive, but no more. HYDRA was not take anything more from him.

* * *

Tony made no overt attempt to disguise his approach. No other HYDRA agents leaped out at him and it appeared like it was only Zola in the ritual room. The room was covered with sigils and runes, some painstakingly carved into the stone while others were painted on with what looked suspiciously like blood. It was debatable if they were of human or animal origin. There were black candles lit up at several key points on the floor, which held the biggest carving of an inverted pentagram. All in all, it was the perfectly eerie setup to be summoning a big bad devil into the material realm.

"Not interrupting anything, am I?" he said loudly to get Zola's attention.

If the situation weren't so serious, he would've laughed at the way Zola had started and looked up at him with wide, disbelieving eyes from where he had been in the middle of weaving complex hand symbols that made the air before the evil wizard glow in patterns. Even as it were, he still found it funny and couldn't quite suppress a smirk.

"You!"

"Please, don't be so dreadfully clichéd and attempt to ask how I managed to get down here. Seriously, your idea of security? Really, _really _bad. All those goons you were throwing at us? Barely any decently tricky booby traps on the way here? Were you even aiming to stall us? Trying to properly summon a greater devil takes quite a lot of time, you know. Did you even do your research?"

Zola sputtered indignantly. "The Winter-"

"Ah yes, HYDRA's prized assassin. You know, I think whatever mind whammy thing you did to the guy is probably starting to wear off or it wasn't nearly as strong as you thought it was. When we encountered him, he didn't even do anything but head straight to take on Steve. He didn't even look in my direction once. What good is a brainwashed assassin who can't follow orders?"

Zola seemed momentarily at a loss for what to say before visibly pulling himself together. "It is of no matter. You alone cannot stop me."

"Wanna bet?"

Tony didn't bother waiting for Zola to reply. He stretched his arms out before him, palms facing the nearest point of the inverted pentagram and whipped a bolt of energy at it. To his surprise, a shield flickered to life, deflecting the blast harmlessly away. Huh. He had to give credit to Zola for reacting as fast as he had. Guess the old wizard wasn't one of HYDRA's best assets for nothing. Then he found himself dodging a fireball. Zola had now abandoned advancing the ritual to, instead, focus on eliminating Tony.

He grinned.

The next few minutes passed in a flurry of spells and invocations being exchanged, leaving the ritual in its incomplete stages. Zola, though not a battle-oriented mage, was still proving to be a decent challenge with offensive spells. The other wizard was also doing an impressive job of safely deflecting Tony's blasts away from the important points of the ritual's setup. Clearly, it was important that the summoning ritual go through successfully. It just made Tony all the more determined to prevent that from happening.

Well, if directly pinpointing the pentagram was not having an effect, then he'd just have to do things in a roundabout fashion.

Tony threw a particularly nasty amalgamation of invocations in Zola's direction, which would hopefully hamper him enough to not be able to figure out Tony's actual intentions. He ignored the resulting twinge in his chest due to it. Yeah, he had been sticking to less complex (and hence, less powerful) invocations lately but this was not the time to be worrying about the condition of his heart. Besides, he estimated that he still had ways to go before he really had to worry about overusing his powers.

Taking Zola's cry of pain to be proof of a successful diversion, Tony directed his next eldritch blast up towards the ceiling. Like he had expected, nothing appeared to divert or neutralize his attack. A large crack started winding its way through the stone ceiling and tiny pebbles and dust began to rain down. Tony hit the crack again with another targeted blast and finally, larger pieces of the ceiling began to fall, knocking over several candles and cutting through some of the sigils.

"No!" Zola's voice cried out, an equal mix of denial and fear coloring his voice.

Which… was a little strange. Tony could understand denial, but fear? Not quite. Sure, the Red Skull was probably going to be more than a little pissed but the reason that a ritual was needed to summon the devil in the first place meant that the devil was not powerful enough to get through on his own, probably due to specially targeted wards or the like. That meant that the Red Skull's mental influence would not be toogreat either, so Zola shouldn't sound that fearful of whatever potential punishment.

Then Tony noticed what the other wizard had seen before he had.

Zola had been standing in one of the arms of the inverted pentagram when Tony had first entered the room, now the wizard was backing away from the center of the pentagram. There was a light beginning to glow and pulsate erratically. Then lightning-like sparks began to leap out from the ball of light and Zola flinched even though none of the sparks flew anywhere near him.

Seconds later, Tony was able to fully feel the disordered flow of energy in the room even though he was not actively trying to sense it. As counterintuitive as it may seem, even when harnessing Chaos energy, there was some sort of order to it. The rules weren't as strict but there was still some form of control to using it. This tenuous control was now unraveling. Even so, Tony could not feel a tear forming between the planes when he sharpened his concentration, which meant that the fledging portal was still closed. Closed but destabilizing all the same. He realized that whatever step he had interrupted Zola in, it had been crucial to the stability of the portal and diverting Zola's attention away from completing that step now seemed to not be an entirely good move. But well, he had no way of knowing just what he'd interrupted.

Using his stronger ties to Chaos, Tony attempted to wrestle with the energy gathered in the primitive portal, trying to force it within the appropriate boundaries.

"It's no use," Zola suddenly said. "This ritual is very delicate. There's no salvaging it if any part went awry."

Diverting his attention from the portal for a moment, Tony saw that Zola was now at the doorway of the room. Why did it not surprise Tony that Zola was abandoning the plan now and retreating to safety instead?

"So you're going to run. You guys don't need this base anymore?"

"We have countless others. This fortress no longer matters," Zola replied with a shrug. Then with a wave of his hand, the wizard disappeared, teleporting himself away to safety.

While it irked him to let the enemy in front of him get away, Tony was far more concerned about the portal going unchecked. Despite Zola's words, he was still going to try to control the energy and have it disperse in a manner that wouldn't lead to things going boom. But just to be on the safe side, he was going to have his friends clear out of the fortress first.

He quickly set up a barrier around the ball of light, preventing it from growing any larger while he diverted the rest of his attention to sending a telepathic message. He rarely used this ability, and if done wrongly, it could even damage himself and that was not an outcome that he wanted. He ran through his group of friends to determine who would be best suited to receive a telepathic message from him and not get dangerously distracted when they were likely still in the middle of mopping up all the HYDRA agents.

_Hey, Natasha. Just wanted to let you know that the portal's still closed but well, whatever there was of it is getting unstable. Zola escaped and you all need to get out now. I'll be sticking behind to dissipate the portal properly or buy you guys more time if it can't be done._

Tony supposed that he was lucky that this method of transmitting a message was a one-way street. He was sure that Natasha would have choice words for him but he really did not mind not knowing them. Message sent, he turned back to the job at hand. The barrier was still holding, so he took the opportunity to carefully sense and analyze the energies gathered in the room. Zola had said that it was impossible to prevent a disaster from occurring but he was not going to take it as the truth until he had fully analyzed the situation for himself.

His mind whirred as his senses fed him increasing amounts of information about the portal and its energy flux. He could not help but frown once he realized just how big the devastation would be if the portal was left unchecked. Yet the calculations he was making could not seem to completely nullify the portal without some form of collateral damage occurring and even the smallest blast zone would take the entire fortress down with it.

Then his temporary barrier finally lost out to the battering from the portal's energy. Tony had to quickly begin with his best option of siphoning away enough of the portal's energy to reduce the output of the blast should it happen. He worked himself hard, a part of him concentrated on controlling the energies while another part desperately ran through calculations and simulations that changed the way he handled the portal's deterioration. All the while, he ignored the recurring twinge in the vicinity of his chest that was slowly becoming a constant ache. So he was doing all he could do control the deterioration but he was beginning to sense the truth in Zola's words. The best that he could do would be to delay the implosion but it would still happen sooner or later. He could no longer afford any distractions, not even to send another quick message to Natasha to urge his friends away from the fortress if they'd yet to do so.

He really hoped they had.

* * *

Steve and Natasha were now back where they'd started and were helping Peggy, Clint and Bruce (still shifted) deal with the remaining members of HYDRA that were still alive or not incapacitated. There had truly been an _endless_ amount of low-ranking agents thrown at them and the sheer number of them in and of itself had given Steve a very uneasy feeling. Because if HYDRA had so many men to spare so thoughtlessly, then just how large was the cult?

It was around this time when, suddenly, he heard Natasha curse with feeling, followed by the sound of choked off cries of pain from the two people she had been dealing with. Steve was not surprised to see the duo unfortunate enough to encounter Natasha lying unmoving, most likely dead, on the floor.

"What's wrong Natasha?" he asked, because that was considered something like an overreaction on Natasha's part.

"The portal's not open but it's destabilized and going to bring down the fortress. Zola has escaped and Tony _ordered_ us to retreat."

"What about him?"

"He said he's going to stay and neutralize the portal. In the worst case scenario, he would be buying us time."

Now, Steve understood just why Natasha had cursed. Because of course Tony would do that, would sacrifice himself so that they could escape. Logically, they should follow what Tony had told them because there was no need for them to perish with the collapse of the portal. But at the moment, he was so, _so _tempted to ignore logic – at least when applied to just himself – and go after the warlock.

Natasha probably correctly interpreted the look on his face because she added, "Steve, I don't like doing what Tony says as much as you do. But… we have to trust him. He'll come out of this alive."

Reluctantly, Steve nodded. "Right. Let's tell the others."

In his mind, he sent a prayer to the gods, praying for Tony's safe return.

* * *

The degradation of the portal was accelerating as time slipped by, almost at a rate faster than a mortal could handle, so it was a good thing that Tony was not an ordinary man. But he had a limiting factor in that his body was weakening as his broad-scale manipulation of the portal's energies involved great use of his warlock abilities as well as a level of concentration and control he rarely used. This was especially exhausting because he had so much riding on the line. In the end though, Tony knew that it was going to come down to how much strain his heart could take before giving out permanently and whether the portal would destabilize completely before that happened.

Perhaps it was the situation at hand but Tony found himself involuntarily recalling some of the thoughts that had gone through his head during the earlier days after he'd been cursed. After repeated failures in finding a permanent cure, he had briefly considered going out in a blaze of glory, refusing to bow to the curse that was now tied to his powers. But now when he found that he was in a situation that could really cause it to happen, Tony realized even more strongly that he truly wanted to live. In the past, he had Rhodey and Pepper. Now, he still had them and had gained even more people whom he cared about.

_Steve, _a part of his mind whispered.

Yes, Steve. Steven Rogers who had shaken up his life the moment Tony had laid eyes on him and still continued to do so. Tony had been unsure of whether he should initiate a change in his and Steve's friendship. He had not had a serious relationship and taking that step forward was daunting. He didn't know if the paladin was interested so he hadn't wanted to risk it. But things were all beginning to fall into perspective now and he wanted a chance to at least tell Steve.

The chances of his survival at this point were distinctively low, Tony could admit that, but miracles were known to happen.

Decision made, he recalculated for his new resolve. There was still no way for the implosion to _not _happen, so he shifted his focus to account for impediment of portal decomposition and damage control. Once he had the best result, Tony threw up his hands before him, palms facing the crackling energy ball and then formed the strongest possible barrier. Chaos leapt to his command readily and though there was some interference due to the portal, it did not do much to deter Tony's command over the forces. He made good use of the less rigid properties of Chaos energy, making the barrier strong but able to adapt to contain the fluctuations in the portal's energy output so that it would last close to twice as long as a normal barrier would.

Once everything was in order, Tony began his swift retreat. It was going to be next to impossible for him to make it out of the fortress but if he was a respectable distance away from the portal, he would definitely have an increased chance of survival. He put on a burst of speed, unconsciously activating the invocation that granted him flight.

Agony lanced through him. Then he crashed against the wall, sliding to the ground, gasping for breath.

His last invocation, the invocation that he'd been using so frequently lately that he just hadn't thought about it, was going to be his undoing. The last invocation that fed into the curse which was now fully devouring his heart and with it, his life. Had he the breath, he would probably have laughed at the irony that it was going to be the curse after all that did him in. Tony clutched reflexively at his chest, knowing that the action would do nothing to relieve the pain of dying via cardiac arrest.

His last thought was that he really should've taken a chance with Steve sooner.


	8. Chapter 8

_**Diamond in the Rough**_

_Chapter 8_

Steve waited anxiously, well out of the potential blast zone that Bruce had managed to determine based on what information they had, with the rest of his team minus Tony. From his peripheral vision, he noted Peggy looking over Bucky who was still unconscious. He had told Peggy about what had transpired between them, how Bucky seemed to be fighting against the brainwashing but it seemed to cause him intense pain until Natasha knocked him out with a strong sedative. Steve _was_ worried about Bucky, but right now, with no sign of Tony and intermittent tremors rocking the earth, he was very much more concerned over the missing warlock.

Tony had bought them time by delaying the inevitable implosion of the destabilized portal but none of them knew for certain how much time that exactly was. Bruce, now turned fully human, had said that there were a combination of factors involved but hadn't gone into detail, probably because it would get too technical for most of them to understand. From what Steve had gathered though, it felt like a lot of skill and even more luck was required for it all to work out such that even Tony could be clear of the potential fallout in time. So with Tony still nowhere in sight, it was definitely not doing wonders for Steve's nerves.

"He'll come out," Natasha murmured as she appeared beside him, her eyes fixed on the fortress too. "He promised."

It was not terribly consoling to Steve that even Natasha, calm and unflappable Natasha, sounded like she was trying to convince herself that it was true. But still he held on to hope.

This whole raid on HYDRA's fortress and possibly the whole journey since the point he'd met Tony had made a huge impact on Steve. As his worry grew with each passing minute, he could no longer ignore his feelings regarding Tony that he had pushed aside to focus on the quest and then on Bucky when his best friend had reappeared in another guise. Now, all the chances he'd failed to take because he was uncertain and afraid came to his mind, and he knew it had to change. Steve decided now, that once Tony came out, he was going to confess.

Then, without warning, the fortress imploded.

Someone screamed out an anguished denial. It took Steve a long moment before he realized that it had been himself who'd produced that gut-wrenching sound and that Bruce and Clint were both straining to hold him back from running straight to the crumbling structure. Holding him back from going to find Tony because it would surely end in his death if he got anywhere near the falling rocks.

"No, no, no."

He couldn't stop himself from repeating those words, nor could he tear his eyes away from the crumbling stone fortress that had once been HYDRA's stronghold.

HYDRA. Why did it always have to be this cursed organization? Why did it seem that he would always lose someone precious to HYDRA?

It seemed to take an eternity before all the rumbling stopped and the fortress was nothing but piles and piles of jumbled stone and debris. Even though he knew that there was practically zero chance for anyone to survive the cave in, he found himself still refusing to give up hope. Not until he saw a body. Because, just… just look at what happened with Bucky! And… and Natasha said that Tony had promised!

(But yes, there was a part of him that knew that he was kidding himself.)

He shook off Bruce and Clint's arms and they let him go without a word of protest. Steve made his way towards the ruined building, single-minded determination in his head. He was vaguely aware of footsteps behind him, that his friends were all still following him despite the undeniably foolish thing he was about to attempt. Then, he was next to a sizeable pile of rubble, and Steve began to dig, began to shift the stone and rubble away.

Bruce murmured something from behind him and then gradually, the largest pieces of the wreckage began to levitate and move away, reducing the amount of work they had to do. At the same time, Natasha and Clint joined in, their hands moving as quickly as it was possible to shift aside rock and dig down. No one else spoke but there was a sense of urgency and barely restrained fear in the air that Steve was sure they all felt. Time seemed to slow, however, and it felt like he'd been digging for an eternity and that it was going to be all…

No, he couldn't let himself think that way. He had to hope. He _had to._

Later, Steve would wonder if it had merely been coincidence that led to a portion of the detritus crumbling harmlessly to the side and unearthing an arm that Clint had seen immediately. But that would be later.

"Steve!"

He turned to look at Clint, the urgency in the archer's voice catching his attention and shaking him out of the trance-like state he had fallen into while digging. The archer was making his way quickly towards a portion of the ruins that had shifted, revealing… an arm! It probably took Steve just the slightest bit longer than Clint, but once he spotted the gold ring inlaid with a blue diamond, he knew that it was Tony.

The process of uncovering the rest of Tony proceeded at what felt like an even slower pace but Steve did not dare risk upsetting the delicate balance of the surrounding rocks and structures. They were so close to reaching Tony. Little by little, more and more of Tony was uncovered, until they finally had all the rocks and rubble that had been covering him moved away.

Tony was motionless, his eyes closed and he was bleeding from various shallow cuts.

Steve reached out a hand, wanting to touch, to heal when his eyes caught sight of something he had never noticed before. The chainmail that Tony wore was damaged, and a part that was covering his chest had peeled aside, revealing Tony's skin underneath. What was unusual, however, was a strange marking of thick black lines and as Steve watched, the lines pulsed, changing from black to blue-white and then back again.

The last time Steve had really seen Tony's chest uncovered had been the day they'd met Bruce. But had the mark been there? He couldn't be sure, because some parts of his memories of that day were indistinct at best, clouded as his mind was filled with equal parts fear and desperation. It was possible that he'd missed seeing it entirely as he was just so focused on healing the warlock. But he could still remember Bruce telling him to focus his attentions over Tony's chest. Was this mark the reason for that piece of advice?

"Bruce," he said, knowing that his voice was oddly calm. "Did you know about this… mark?"

"Yes, but this is the first time I've seen it."

The wizard's voice was subdued. Steve ignored the flash of hurt and unbecoming jealousy that made themselves known in his chest. It was not the time.

"What does it do?"

"Tony told me he was cursed a few years back. The mark weakens his heart the more he uses his warlock powers."

Steve did not know what to say. Tony had, in his obscure way, told him about the curse, describing it as a heart condition. He hadn't pushed then, even though he had wanted to know how it could affect Tony. Not just in battle, even though that was important too, but because he genuinely wanted to know so he could help. He hadn't pushed because their friendship had still been new and he'd already seen how closed off Tony could be about personal details even before revealing that he wasn't Antonius but Anthony Stark. Now, he wished that he had found the opportunity to ask.

So, instead of replying to Bruce, he turned back to Tony, taking off his gauntlets as he prepared to heal the warlock. The mark had stopped glowing but Steve had no idea if that was a good thing or not. He laid his bare palm on top of Tony's chest and-

There was no heartbeat.

He pushed his palm firmly down again but there was still no pulse. Steve bent further down, hovering over Tony's face, trying to feel for Tony's breath.

Nothing.

No. Nononononono.

There was a roaring sound in his ears or maybe it was all in his mind, he wasn't sure. All he knew was that denial was ringing loudly and prominently in his head because no, Tony. He couldn't be… he just…

"Steve! Steve! Breathe!" Clint's worried voice reached him, as if through a body of water, indistinct and muffled.

Someone started pulling him backwards, away from Tony and he let himself be pulled back. All the fight had just gone out of him, unlike when the fortress had just collapsed. Then, it had been easier to hold on to hope. Now, it was harder to deny the truth of the situation when the evidence (Tony's _body_) was lying in front of him. The world was going hazy around him and something about it was becoming a little familiar. Like he hadn't felt this way in a while, but it had happened before…

"Steve! Breathe. Focus on me, Steve!"

Peggy's face swam into view and he registered her touch on his hands.

"Yes, that's it," she murmured, still holding on to his hands tightly.

Gradually, the fog around him seemed to lift and he realized that he had been hyperventilating. It had felt almost like an asthma attack, a sensation he had been very familiar with but had almost forgotten due to the passage of time. Peggy was kneeling before him, blocking part of his view of the scene behind her. He could see Bruce kneeling on the ground and Clint was hovering nearby, Artemis having joined them at some point.

"Peggy…" Steve almost couldn't recognize his voice with how hoarse it sounded.

"Steve, I'm so sorry."

He knew what she was apologizing for and he wanted to tell her that it wasn't anything she should apologize for. It had been rumored that powerful clerics could resurrect the dead but nobody he knew had ever seen that happen before. Peggy was not to blame. A part of him, however, wanted to go back, to try to bring Tony back to life. But it wasn't possible. It was completely out of his power. He had once again lost a friend, no, Tony was _more _than just a friend to him and it was too late. He was always too late. He had gotten an unbelievable second chance with Bucky, but he wasn't holding out for another miracle.

"For one of my best and most devout followers, you are surprisingly pessimistic, Steven," a gruff voice that clearly did not belong to anyone in their group said. It was, however, kind of familiar.

Steve looked up to see a bald, dark-skinned man dressed entirely in black full plate armor complete with a cape. There was also an eye patch covering his left eye and a very familiar star symbol emblazoned on it. He also noticed that Clint had an arrow pointed at the man's head and that Bruce was standing up in front of Tony and the wizard's hands were glowing with magic.

"Who the hell are you? Where did you come from?" Clint demanded, just as Steve put together just who the man actually was.

"Clint, Bruce, it's okay. Stand down. That's the God of War," he said, voice surprisingly calm.

"The God of War dresses like some sort of cross between a dark knight and a bandit. Really?" Clint replied in a deadpan voice, clearing not believing it.

"It _is _Him," Peggy confirmed, her voice hushed with respect.

Slowly, almost reluctantly, Clint lowered his bow. Bruce, too, let his spell fizzle away. Steve, personally, was still a little too numb to feel any astonishment at seeing the War God making a personal appearance. The last encounter he had had with Fury was just before he had become a paladin and the god had paid a visit to his dreamscape to recruit him. But at that time, the god hadn't appeared to him in a humanoid form; Fury had mostly been just this stern voice emanating from His holy symbol. Steve had then woken up from the dream to a whole new body, his asthma gone along with all the other ailments that dragged him down since he was a baby.

"Thank you for averting this crisis. I am pleased to see that you all worked well together, I appreciate the haste that was taken."

Steve supposed that to most clerics and paladins, having the god you served personally thanking you for a job well done would be a moment of utmost honor and glory. But right now, he didn't feel any of that. Yes, they had averted a crisis and yes, it was important, he knew. It was Good and it was right. But it still did not lessen the pain that, in the process of saving the world, Tony had been sacrificed.

"You're welcome, I suppose," Clint retorted bitterly, as if he weren't talking to a god who could smite him where he stood. "Any reason why you couldn't have done something about it before it came down to this?"

His question was punctuated by gesturing to their surroundings but Steve and everyone else read the actual meaning. Couldn't the War God Fury have done something to prevent Tony from having to sacrifice himself?

"The gods aren't fully omniscient or prescient. I do not know all that will happen and I certainly cannot predict everything that can happen. Nor can I always interfere with events that occur on the mortal plane. I sent you, Clint Barton, Margaret Carter and Steven Rogers on this quest because you needed to meet Anthony Stark," Fury explained, unruffled by Clint's brusqueness.

"There needed to be a diverse group of people who could respond to crises and could make use of their varied experiences and knowledge to complement and help each other. HYDRA needed to be stopped but the greater importance was the meeting that I Saw. I had no doubt that HYDRA's plans would be thwarted, but I did not See how it would happen, only that it happened after meeting with Anthony."

"Did you know about Bucky?" Peggy asked.

"Yes. James Barnes' ending up in HYDRA's clutches came to my knowledge. It was however uncertain whether it would be possible for James to have a fighting chance against his brainwashing after he came into contact with you."

"Why did they have to meet Tony?" This time, the person who spoke was Natasha. There was a coldness to her tone that Steve hadn't yet heard before.

"It wasn't clear to me then, but now I know that it's because through Anthony that you, Natasha Romanoff, and Bruce Banner could be brought in to form the group that I had partly Seen."

"Tony is dead," Bruce said quietly. "How would that work now?"

"It is not generally my area of expertise but I can remedy that."

That sounded like… That sounded like Tony could be resurrected and that the God of War would do it.

"You would do that?" Steve asked, unable to keep the hope out of his voice.

"Like I said, Steven, you do place far too little belief in miracles. I am willing to do it, though not for entirely altruistic reasons," Fury replied matter-of-factly. "This team that I want to put together requires Anthony. It would not work otherwise."

"What about Bucky?"

"The spell's effects are already wearing off. I can speed up the process, but the after effects will linger with James for some time and that, I cannot help with."

"Do it," Steve said, then remembering that he _was _actually talking to a god, the god he served no less, he added, "Please."

Fury didn't do much of anything but perhaps blink his single visible eye before he said, "It is done. I would advise keeping a close eye on James when the sedative wears off."

Bruce immediately crouched down beside Tony again, fingers pressing against Tony's neck to feel for a pulse. Steve watched as the tension left the wizard and felt himself relaxing as well. Tony was _alive_.

"The curse mark is still present," Bruce said.

"I've brought Anthony Stark back to life as I said I would," Fury replied. "The curse did not come under that purview."

"That's why he's unconscious, isn't it?" Bruce deduced. "The damage to his heart from the curse did not kill him but it affected him enough to slow him down, cause him to black out during his escape and when the fortress collapsed, it all added up to cause his death."

"So if the curse is not removed, Tony could still end up dying?" Steve demanded. The happiness and relief that had filled him was rapidly fading away.

"Yes. But the curse is not irreversible, and Anthony Stark has been away from Mainheim for a long time." With that cryptic reply, Fury vanished.

"No! Wait!" Steve cried out, but it was already too late.

Damn it. Tony was alive but he might not stay that way. Already, Bruce's expression was turning grim. Peggy went over to Tony's side as well, healing over the superficial wounds. She started to frown when her hands hovered over the curse mark. Steve went over as well, unable to keep away as worry and fear began to creep up on him.

"The curse has… gotten stronger," Peggy said to him. "I can't really heal the damage to his heart. If this persists, he will die."

No, he couldn't have Tony brought back to life only to lose him again before Steve had the chance to tell him. It didn't matter if Tony did not reciprocate his feelings, he needed to let Tony know. There had to be a way to break the curse, especially if the greatest wizardry minds…

"We need to get him back to Mainheim, back to the Starks," Steve said, abruptly realizing what Fury's parting words meant.

"The Starks have resources… If I can use their information, I'm sure I can find a counter-curse," Bruce said.

"Tony's not going to like it when he wakes up," Natasha pointed out, but it didn't seem like she was truly objecting to the plan.

"Unless one of you has a teleport spell on hand, Mainheim is still really far away," Clint said. "How much time does Tony have?"

"I believe I can help with that," a new but familiar voice said.

"Coulson! Where did _you_ come from?" Clint exclaimed.

"I was informed of the situation," Coulson replied calmly. "Gather everyone around me so I can bring all of you back to the church. We have no time to waste."

* * *

When everyone had been safely transported to the church in Mainheim, they found that they were not the only people present in the room that Coulson had taken them to. There were a few healers and Coulson instructed them to take a still unconscious Bucky to a private healer's room. Steve was torn between staying with Tony and following after Bucky, but Peggy placed her hand on his shoulder and indicated that she would follow Bucky and Steve nodded to her in gratitude. Other than the healers, there was one other person. He was a rather elderly man, with grey-white hair and dressed formally like a butler.

"Mr. Coulson," the man spoke in a mildly annoyed tone. "If you could please inform me of the reason for requesting the presence of-"

The man's voice broke off as he took in the sight of Tony, lying on a magically suspended sheet. He took several steps forward, eyes never leaving Tony's still form. As Steve watched, tears welled up in the older man's eyes.

"Is… is that…?" he started to ask but was unable to complete it as his voice was shaking with emotion.

"Yes," Coulson replied gently. "It is Anthony Stark."

"I thought I'd never see him again. What… what happened to Master Anthony?"

"You must be Edwin Jarvis," Natasha spoke up, a slight smile on her face. "Tony has mentioned you."

Steve had known of Edwin Jarvis by name, though for all the times he had been in the Stark manor, he had not seen the man. Usually he was greeted by another butler or footman, but Howard had mentioned Jarvis a couple of times, most often as an off-hand comment about having to make sure he wasn't working too hard or he'd be chastised by the old family butler.

"I, yes, I am. I'm the head butler of the Stark household," Jarvis said. "Please pardon me for not introducing myself. I… I'm just…"

"It's alright, Jarvis," Coulson said, still keeping his tone gentle. "It must have been a shock. We wanted a member of the Stark clan here because of Anthony. He's alive but because of a curse, he will die if a counter-spell is not found. We need the resources the Stark clan can provide."

Taking a breath and drawing himself up straighter, Jarvis replied in a more composed voice, "Yes, certainly. I will personally ensure that access to the Stark family library and archives will be available for perusal. I presume that Master Anthony will be brought home to recuperate?"

"Yes, if that's what you wish."

"Good." Then to the rest of them, Jarvis said with a slight smile, "You must all be Master Anthony's friends. Mere words cannot express the magnitude of my gratitude towards all of you for finding him. It would be an honor for you to stay at the Stark manor."

"If it's not too much trouble," Bruce replied, looking faintly abashed at the sincerity in Jarvis' words. "I… I'm a wizard and I would like to help in breaking the curse on Tony and it would be more accessible from the manor."

"It is never any trouble to have Master Anthony's friends over," Jarvis replied.

Everyone present in the room, except for Coulson, began to make preparations to transport Tony safely to the Stark manor.

"Steven, I'm sorry," Coulson suddenly said, looking visibly apologetic about having to mention it. "You need to attend a debriefing now."

A part of him wanted very badly to resist, to leave with Bruce and Natasha to the Stark manor so that he could watch over Tony. But he knew his duty and also knew that the best care would be provided for Tony. Jarvis had been overwhelmed when seeing Tony again after such a long time and genuinely cared for the warlock. Steve was sure that the old butler would provide everything needed for Tony to get better. Coulson had also sent another of the church's healers to accompany Tony so Tony would still be okay for a while longer. Certainly long enough for Steve to give his report and then head to the manor.

"I understand," he replied. "Let's get started then."

The sooner the debriefing finished, the faster he could return to Tony's side.

* * *

After the debriefing, Steve paid a visit to the room Bucky was now sequestered in. His friend was still unconscious but Peggy reassured him that it was just the sedative and that as far as she could tell there was nothing wrong with Bucky physically. She didn't say anything about his mental condition but Steve could read the truth of that without any input. There would be after-effects and they were not going to be pretty. But as long as Bucky was safe and back here with them, they would be able to get through it.

"There's somewhere else you'd like to be, isn't that right Steve?"

"I… well, yes."

"Then go. I'll let you know when Bucky wakes."

So he went.

Steve was familiar with the way to the Stark manor, having been there first to test his compatibility with the shield and later on for the periodic checks that Howard liked to conduct. As a child, growing up in Mainheim also meant that he'd always known about the large Stark manor. Now he wondered if he had ever seen Tony before, whenever he and Bucky had decided to wander close to see the manor and fantasize about owning a house even half its size.

In no time at all, he was at the gates, which opened as he drew near. He guessed that his arrival was anticipated and was proven right when the main doors opened to reveal Jarvis standing there with a warm smile on his face.

"Captain Rogers, welcome," Jarvis greeted him with a slight bow.

"Please call me Steve," he replied. "How is Tony?"

Jarvis' smile dimmed a little. "Master Anthony is still unconscious. Miss Romanoff is in the room with him, and the last I heard, she was quietly threatening him with much pain if he were to die. Mr. Banner is currently in the library doing research."

"May I see Tony?"

"Of course, Captain. Please follow me."

Though it was far from Steve's first visit to the manor, he had not gone to the private areas of the large house. Jarvis led him through unfamiliar hallways until they finally stopped in front of a set of double doors. It looked much like any other set of doors in the mansion, until Steve started to notice faint burn marks and scratched areas.

Noticing what he was looking at, Jarvis said with a slight chuckle, "When Master Anthony was young, he liked conducting experiments with any magical trinkets and artifacts he could get his hands on. He also liked to build things from scratch. Sometimes, they resulted in… less than satisfactory outcomes."

Even Steve smiled a little. "I think I can imagine that," he said, thinking back to the time he'd seen Tony's workshop and how parts and random tools were scattered around.

Then Jarvis pushed open the double doors to reveal a large bedroom. Steve saw Natasha sitting on an armchair by the large four-poster bed before the redhead turned around to look at them.

"Steve, Jarvis."

Steve walked further into the room, all the way in until he was beside the bed and looking down at Tony. Tony was pale and he looked infinitely smaller and more fragile, swathed in the sheets of the large bed. But he was still alive and breathing and Steve would do everything in his power to make sure Tony would be well and alive in the near future.

"There's been no change, I guess?" he asked Natasha.

"No, he's still the same as when we brought him back. For now, that's a good thing."

"Do Pepper and Rhodes know?"

"Yes, I've sent a message to them. They're both on their way over now."

"Don't they need to help Tony run Ironfields?"

Natasha smiled faintly. "Everyone in Ironfields adores Pepper and even more than that, they're protective of Tony. The population of Ironfields is largely made up of people who had been cast out for unjust reasons and who were considered misfits. We guard our own. Everything will still be smoothly running even in Pepper and Rhodey's absence."

Steve had not really noticed that but it explained the diverse mix of races in the town. It was yet another manifestation of Tony's kindness. He was glad that there were other people who would look out for Tony, even though he suspected that the warlock was unaware of that himself. Tony needed people to help look out for his general wellbeing.

"Has… has Lord Stark been by?" he then asked Jarvis, who was now standing at the foot of the bed.

"No. He is… busy."

The pause before Jarvis said "busy" was telling, as was the slight frown on the older man's face. Steve was sure that Jarvis would've informed Howard about Tony and the curse. There could not be anything more important than seeing your missing son finally come home.

"Is he helping Bruce with finding a counter-curse?"

"Master Howard is in his workshop."

A sort of calm, cold anger settled around Steve. He found that a part of him had still held out hope that his old mentor wasn't as bad as Tony had described, but in the face of this, it was getting harder to think otherwise. Howard Stark was a brilliant wizard and Steve was sure that with his help, the process of finding a permanent counter-curse would be sped up significantly.

Steve had sworn to himself to do everything in his power to help Tony and if that included confronting his mentor, then he would gladly do it.

"I'm going to see him," he announced.

"Very well, I will take you there, Captain," Jarvis said, a note of approval in his voice.

* * *

With Jarvis leading the way, Steve soon found himself in more familiar territory. He thanked Jarvis for his help, stating that he would prefer to go the rest of the way by himself. Mostly, Steve didn't think it would be appropriate for him to be essentially lecturing Jarvis' employer in front of the butler, even if the older man probably knew what would happen.

After the butler had left, Steve continued down the long hallway to the workshop. He tried to compose himself, to carefully find the right words to say to Howard to make his mentor realize that he had to help. Howard could be stubborn but unless he was completely wrong about his mentor, then there had to be a part of the other man that loved his son and would do everything he could to save him.

Now standing outside the workshop door, Steve could not hear any sounds that signified that Howard was working. So he knocked twice and then proceeded to open the door, stepping in and then shutting the door behind him. As he had guessed, Howard was not working. Instead, the other man's back was to Steve, leaning over a worktable that had an opened bottle of whiskey and a glass that was half-full of the alcohol.

"I said no interruptions, Jarvis," Howard said without turning around.

"I'm not Jarvis."

Howard turned around swiftly, eyes wide with surprise, though a smile quickly found its way onto his face. "Steve! This is unexpected. How are you?"

Steve found that he couldn't quite bring himself to smile back at Howard, even though it _was_ good to see him again. "It's not really that unexpected, is it, Howard?"

The smile slipped off Howard's face, turning his expression into one of resignation as he sat back against the tabletop. "So I guess it's straight to business."

"It's not "business". Tony is your son, who's been cursed and will probably die if a cure isn't found. Why are you drinking in your workshop, Howard?"

"…escape. Denial, maybe. It's hard to believe that my son is back."

"Do you even know why he ran away?" he asked.

"Not for certain but I have some ideas," Howard answered. "You already know how we weren't very close, don't you? I know Tony believes that I didn't love him and that I was never proud of him. That's not true. _He's my son._ He picked up everything taught to him so fast, with magic being the only hiccup. But there was no denying that Tony was a child prodigy and I was so proud of him."

"I don't think that you showed it to him."

"Yes, I realized that. I'm… I'm not very good with showing affection and I have always gotten too caught up in my work. Then it was working on your shield and after Tony manifested as a warlock, I felt afraid for him. I'm fully aware of the prejudice that warlocks face, most rightly so, but Tony didn't deserve any of it and I was afraid that if it was found out…"

Howard let out a mirthless chuckle, looking like he had aged ten years in an instant.

"I panicked. I didn't want my son to be exposed to the way society thought of warlocks and I also didn't want him in contact with the shield, because Good magical energy never interacted well with the darker energies that warlocks manipulated. I was afraid that Tony's curiosity would cause him to get injured and so I reacted thoughtlessly. So in the end, in wanting to protect him, I ended up ostracizing him even more. I always meant to make amends but by then, Tony had given up on reaching out towards me and rebuffed my attempts to engage him.

"Then Maria passed away and…" Howard closed his eyes, taking a fortifying breath before continuing, "And I was in a very bad place. I turned to drinking, excessive amounts of drinking for days. I neglected Tony during those days after the wake and the funeral. When I finally got my head out of the bottle and realized that I needed to see to my son, he was gone. No note, nothing. I looked for him. But the longer he stayed missing, I started to realize that Tony didn't want to be found. So I… decided to let him go. He was never really happy here. Only Maria and Jarvis treated him normally and showed their love for him. I thought… I thought that he'd be better off free, not tied to the Stark name. Not tied to _me_.

"Now that Tony's back but with a fatal curse, I just… I was hit by the realization that I could've lost my son permanently any time over those seven years and I would never have even _known_."

"You love him, Howard," Steve said gently, unable to be _not _affected by his mentor's confession. It still did not make up for the neglect Howard had showed Tony, but there was still a chance for Howard to make a difference. "You can't undo the past but there's still the present. You shouldn't be hiding yourself away to drink again. Tony's still alive, there's still time and I can't speak for Tony so I don't know if he'll forgive you, but you… you owe it to him to find a way to dispel the curse."

"I… I know, Steve. I… Thank you, I needed that wake up call. It was just overwhelming to find him again."

"Have you actually seen him?"

"If you can count the scrying device I used."

After Tony had revealed his identity, Steve had noticed the similarities that Howard and Tony shared. Right now, it was even more obvious and he wondered how he'd missed the signs for such a long time.

"Go pay him a proper visit. Though I can't guarantee that Natasha won't threaten you in some way."

"Is she Tony's girl?"

A laugh startled itself out of Steve. "Oh no, _no_. They're friends and Natasha started out by working for him. Tony's generally known by another name now. You might have heard of the warlock Antonius?"

Howard blinked. "That… that was Tony?"

"Yes but don't worry, he's now more focused on blacksmithing and inventing things," he assured Howard, guessing that Howard was thinking once again about how Tony had been in a dangerous line of work and could've died in battle with himself being none the wiser. "He has two other friends who help him run his business and town."

A soft smile, unlike the ones Steve had ever seen on Howard's face, curved the older man's lips. "He's done well for himself, hasn't he?"

Steve saw the quiet wonder and pride from both his mentor's eyes and his tone of voice. At the same time there was the faintest hint of a deep-rooted regret that Howard hadn't been there beside Tony and hadn't seen it happen for himself. But most importantly, Steve could now see the resolve in Howard to help his son and begin the journey towards reconciliation and making amends.

"Yeah, he has," he agreed.

"You'll make a good advisor and mentor to someone one day, Steve."

He felt a blush rise to his cheeks at Howard's words and finally realized that he had been, essentially, lecturing his own mentor for the better part of their conversation. But Howard seemed to be in genuinely good spirits or at least, better spirits than before, and so Steve decided that he didn't have to worry.

Howard didn't wait for Steve to reply before the man stood up. "Okay, I've wasted enough time as it is. I'll be joining Mr. Banner in the library."

"I'll help."

"I'm the last person who should tell you this but Steve, you should take a rest. It's been an eventful day. I may send Mr. Banner away from the library soon too."

"But-"

"Steve, just rest for now. You've done much already. Thank you for bringing my son back."

Knowing that he would not be allowed to help until the next day, Steve backed down gracefully. "You're welcome."

* * *

To say that he was surprised to find himself opening his eyes again and not see the equivalent of an afterlife was an understatement. A very large one. Tony had willingly stayed behind to buy his friends enough time to evacuate before the destabilized portal collapsed on itself and brought everything else down with it. Though he'd tried to make his way out, he also had been fully prepared to die despite having promised Natasha to come back out alive. When it came down to the line, when it was a choice between his life and those of his friends… There really wasn't a choice.

His body felt sluggish and weak. He was tucked into a plush, four-poster bed that seemed really familiar and when he could manage to move his head to take in the rest of his surroundings, he was once again surprised. Though it had been years since he'd been anywhere _near_ this place, he now recognized where he was at once. It was… it was his room back in the Stark family home. How was this even possible? Was he actually dead then? So was this some form of twisted punishment for the things that he'd done?

Before he could really start to panic, however, he heard the door to his room open. In short order, Steve appeared at the edges of his field of vision. _Steve._ Was this also a hallucination?

"Tony! You're awake!" Steve exclaimed, a bright and relieved smile lighting up his face.

The blond hurried over to his bedside and Tony couldn't help but just stare. The sunlight filtering into the room through the gap between the drawn curtains lit up Steve's hair in mesmerizing golden streaks and it looked just like how it did when he'd seen it in the past. Did that mean…?

"I'm… I'm not dead, right?"

Steve shook his head though the smile on his face dimmed a little, and Tony, strangely enough (well, it was not really that strange, to be honest), mourned that slight loss. Steve looked great when he smiled and Tony really wouldn't mind seeing it for a lot longer.

"No, you're not. Or at least, you didn't stay dead."

Well, that sounded ominous. Kind of. "What happened?"

"We found you in the rubble of the destroyed fortress but you weren't breathing. Then Fury appeared-"

"Did you just say _the God of War_ appeared? _After_ everything was over?" The outrage was clear in his voice.

"He brought you back to life, Tony," Steve gently admonished, probably guessing why exactly he was upset. "But you were still unconscious so we were transported back to Mainheim and the rest of us found out that you had been cursed. With Howard's help, Bruce managed to dispel it eventually. It's been two weeks since then and we've all been worried sick."

Though he registered that two weeks was quite a period of time to be in a coma, Tony couldn't help but zero in on one specific part of Steve's speech. "Howard? _Dad _helped?"

"Yes, he did," Steve confirmed.

There was a pause as Tony tried to process what he'd just learnt. That his father had been concerned enough to help. Or even if he'd needed persuasion… Another Stark family trait that Tony had inherited was definitely stubbornness. Nobody made a Stark do something he or she didn't want to, even if they hadn't know they'd wanted to do it at first. Which _still _meant that…

"When you're feeling better," Steve added a moment later. "I really think that the two of you should talk."

"I… I guess." Honestly, he was still a little gobsmacked at the implication.

"Tony, why did you keep the curse a secret?"

There was probably never going to be a good time to bring it up, so Tony decided that he might as well have that conversation over and done with. Steve had so kindly brought it up after all.

"It's not much consolation, I know, but only Bruce knew about it and you were the only other person to even have an inkling that I wasn't physically as well as I appeared to be. It's just… I spent a long time not being allowed to show weakness to anybody, of being ashamed of any vulnerabilities. It's still hard to shake that feeling, Steve. I'm sorry."

"You promised Natasha that you would come back out."

He winced slightly. Natasha was going to be _pissed_ at him for actually dying, even if he was now alive again. "I know, I'm really sorry. I tried. It wasn't in my intentions to deliberately get killed, I swear."

"Yes, I know that. I really thought I'd lost you and that I wouldn't be able to tell you."

"Tell me what, Steve?"

Steve did not reply immediately and for a moment, Tony thought that perhaps Steve would not speak at all, that perhaps Steve hadn't meant to say what he had. But he was proven wrong.

"I feared that I wouldn't be able to tell you that I love you."

Tony thought that perhaps he had misheard Steve. He _had_ just woken up from coming back from the dead _and _having a fatal curse removed after all. Perhaps not all of his senses were working properly. But Steve continued to speak.

"This is probably not the best time for me to tell you, but… But when you were dead, when you were _actually _dead, that was my greatest regret. Not letting you know how I feel about you and then it was too late. So when Fury brought you back, I couldn't let that happen again. It doesn't matter if you don't feel the same way, you don't have to say anything. I just… I just wanted you to know."

It was almost surreal. He'd thought he'd lost his chance with Steve when he'd blacked out in the fortress. Never had he dreamt that Steve would be the one confessing to _him _instead.

"Steve."

"Yes?"

"Sit down. On the bed, yes."

Steve complied with his demand, although he looked mildly confused. But Tony was now going to take a leaf out of Steve's book (or rather, his own book before he died and then got brought back to life). He wasn't going to let any more chances be lost.

"Okay, now kiss me."

"Tony?" Steve questioned, but Tony could see the hope lighting up in his azure eyes.

"Kiss. Me," he repeated with deliberate punctuation, unable to keep the smile from his lips now.

And then Tony had Steve's lips covering his own, and it was the best feeling in the world.

There would probably still be many things to work out and not all of it directly involved Steve. For those that did, the main one would be that he needed to tell Steve how he'd gotten cursed in the first place, if Steve hadn't already gotten his answers from Bruce. He wasn't going to lie to Steve anymore. It was not going to be an easy ride, because, as they had proven the first time they'd met, they had opposing temperaments. But it was also because of that that made them click, because they complemented each other.

It would all be worth it, no matter what else happened. It would, and that was all that mattered.

* * *

**So, this is my first ever Big Bang fic! It's been a really long time since I've written (and completed) anything this long and plotty. I certainly didn't expect to double the minimum 25K word count when I first started out. In fact, I had wondered if I could even meet it. Guess I needn't have worried. ^^" The fantasy universe is based on _Dungeons & Dragons_, or at least, the job classes for the characters are, but with artistic license applied whenever necessary.**

**Thank you to my artist, Cammie (I've always had a dream of seeing art for some of the stuff I write), and my beta-reader, Jamie! ****Also, much thanks go to my RL friends who listened to me as I bounced ideas off them, rambled (or whined) to them about the progress (or lack-thereof), and gave me much-needed encouragement and even suggestions on how to improve the fic/resolve certain situations I wrote myself into! T****o the mods of this year's Big Bang, thank you for organizing it! It was stressful at certain points, but ultimately, much fun! :D**

**To the readers, I hope you've enjoyed it!**

_**carzla**_


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